Inheritance
by Hiiraeth
Summary: Sequel to Regeneration. With Minato gone and Kushina's fate still uncertain, Kakashi and Rin navigate new responsibilities in the form of a toddler jinchuuriki who has no one else to depend on, disturbing new powers and ultimately, the quest to bring Senju Tsunade home.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1.**

* * *

 _October 10th, two years after the Kyuubi Attack_.

* * *

The eye was acting up again. Kakashi could feel it burning through his body, making his legs go numb and his fingers tingle. He lay still in his bed and tried to remember how to breathe. Surely, the feeling would fade.

It didn't.

Kakashi had been dealing with nightmares for years, really. He knew the routine of waking up in the wake of terror only to find the rest of the world was still exactly as he had left it. He had learned how to calm his mind and body and return to the real world within a few minutes.

But Minato – Minato. Minato had complicated things.

"Mikoto-sensei," he had asked, a year and a half ago, idly plucking at the grass he had been sitting on," would you say there is a correlation between the Sharingan and emotion?"

"A correlation how?"

"As in, the more powerful the user's emotion, the more powerful the eye?"

She had looked surprised at the question, pausing what she had been doing for long enough to meet his eyes. "Emotion awakens the eye, that much you know. Some say it is also emotion that allows it to evolve. The more common belief is that it evolves through hard work, though."

"Your people aren't sure?" He had asked.

"Perhaps we were once, but information is easily lost as it is passed down through the generations," she had shrugged. "Why do you ask?"

He hadn't answered. He hadn't told anyone, in fact. Well, Rin knew, obviously, but she had seen it.

Obito had once bragged about how his clan's bloodline limit would grow stronger over time; how it started with only one marking but ended with three. Mikoto had explained the process again, in rather greater detail.

Neither of them had ever said anything about waking up from nightmares with the unsettling sense of certainty that their eye was about to swallow up the room.

It was a feeling Kakashi was becoming rather well acquainted with. It always followed dreams of Minato – particularly those where he could no longer see the difference between Minato, Sakumo or Obito, where they all merged together into one faceless being just slightly out of reach.

One time, Kakashi had reached the bathroom mirror in time to see the sharp geometric pattern that had appeared in Obito's eye. Just looking at it had made him violently ill. If he would push chakra into it, the eye would probably eat him alive.

He had tried to come up with solutions. For a while he would bandage his eye shut whenever he slept. Then he had tried not sleeping at all. Then, sleeping pills. Not one of them could seem to stop his chakra from burning through him and into the eye.

Rin thought he had to tell Mikoto. Kakashi thought that would probably land him on an operating table as they surgically removed the eye. He had made a promise to Obito. He would keep it, even if Obito's eye was somehow malfunctioning.

His stomach flipped nervously. His chakra roiled angrily through his body, almost like a separate entity. There was no way he could fall asleep like this. He threw the blankets off and got out of bed. 4 AM. Rin usually woke up at seven. Plenty of time.

Kakashi made no sound as he put on his clothes and slid open the window. He dropped down the two floors that separated him from the street and landed without so much as a sigh. The air felt cold on what little skin was exposed. There was no one in sight.

His body didn't seem to remember it was 4 AM. He moved with a reckless energy and reached the training grounds in no time flat. He breathed in deeply through his nose to try and calm himself down.

"Hatake, this is a tremendously stupid idea," he muttered. Then, he smiled. Obito had always been a proponent of tremendously stupid ideas.

He took position in the middle of the grounds and eyed one of the nearby training posts. He widened his stance and did a few stretches to warm up. An owl hooted. The ground smelled of recent rain and dirt. He couldn't sense anyone human nearby.

Right. He had waited for far too long already. He pushed his headband up and opened his left eye. Energy surged through him fast enough to leave him lightheaded. He blinked. "Okay, okay. Let's go." He clapped his hands together, and pushed chakra into Obito's eye.

What followed felt a little like unplugging his finger from a dam. The eye didn't just take the little sliver of chakra he had offered, no, it clawed at it greedily and then kept _pulling_. _Oh_ , Kakashi thought dizzily, _oh._

He could feel chakra rolling around him like a thunderstorm, pulling and pushing at the world like it was made of cardboard. His knees buckled. The training grounds seemed to disappear around him. The eye took and took and took –

"No!" He wrenched his chakra back into his body and forced his eye shut. He gasped for air. The world spun. The grass felt wet underneath his hands, but he couldn't remember when he had ended up on the ground.

He rolled onto his back. The owl had disappeared. His body felt so _heavy_.

Footsteps in the distance. Hurried ones, too. A voice, ordering someone to stand down. More footsteps, slowly approaching. He should probably care more about that. A face appeared above his own.

"Shimura-san," he said, automatically. He was surprised he could speak at all.

Shimura Danzou's one good eye was wide in alarm. He looked pale in the moonlight. "Hatake," he croaked. "What on earth –" he blinked and beckoned someone over. A moment later there were strong hands helping Kakashi sit up. Some Aburame, by the look of him.

"I was on my way out the Council room when I sensed a disturbance," Danzou said. "Was that you?"

Kakashi blinked slowly. Did he even have a body anymore? He wasn't sure he could still feel it. "Ahh – I think so."

"You think so?" Danzou's companion asked incredulously.

"Yes. I can't feel my face."

Danzou was still staring. After a moment, he shook himself out of it. "Torune, please go on without me. I will make sure Hatake-kun makes it back home."

"But –"

"Just do it."

"Yes Sir."

Danzou turned back to Kakashi. "Do you think you can walk?"

Kakashi considered this. "I sure hope so."

Danzou snorted. "Not to worry. It's not an uncommon result of depleting a lot of chakra very quickly. You'll be right as rain. Come on." He held out his hand.

After a moment of wondering what on earth the hand was for Kakashi figured out what the idea was. He took the hand. Danzou was surprisingly strong for a crippled old man. A good thing too, because Kakashi's legs still felt like jelly. Not unlike his mind, come to think of it. This would all undoubtedly be very embarrassing once he could think again.

The trek back through the village was rather awkward and slow, between Kakashi's loopy limbs and Danzou's bad knee. Danzou was quiet at first. Thoughtful, perhaps. Or focusing on not falling on his face, like Kakashi.

"You're an ambitious young man, aren't you?" Danzou finally said.

Kakashi considered telling him his brain was still taking a dip into Lala land and this really wasn't the best time for him to talk, but that didn't seem like the kind of thing you said to an esteemed councilmember who had just saved you from hypothermia in the cold grass. "I can be," he said instead.

"Do you dream of following in your teacher's footsteps, perhaps?"

Kakashi considered it. "No. Not particularly." Perhaps he had once, before his father had died, and briefly afterwards because what better way could there be to save his family name? But it seemed like a childish dream now. Unreachable and utterly pointless.

"Then why do you fight? Why do you go to the training fields in the middle of the night and exhaust yourself?" Danzou's voice was deep and steady. Kakashi couldn't sense any of deceit or mockery.

"I have promises to keep," Kakashi said.

"Ha. Don't we all?"

"And people to save."

Danzou's brows furrowed and he went quiet again for another block or so. "Nohara-san?" He finally asked.

"She can do her own saving."

Another frown. Another pause. "Uzumaki-san," Danzou guessed. "And her boy."

"Someone has to." And why not him? Kakashi kicked at a pebble. He missed, but he didn't floor himself. He counted that as an improvement.

"How do you save someone who cannot be saved? You are no medic," Danzou sounded puzzled.

" _I'm_ not."

"No one in the village has been able to wake her. I'm not sure – oh. Ah." Danzou's expression shifted subtly. "I seem to remember you met Tsunade-hime a few years ago."

Kakashi's chin dropped to his chest. He hadn't meant to let that slip. "There's no point. I can't find her during my missions, not without completely breaking protocol. It's a pipe dream," he said. An old and familiar anger bubbled up within him. If the Hokage would just do _more_.

Danzou's grip on his arm tightened briefly. They had reached Kakashi's apartment block. "It doesn't have to be," he said unexpectedly.

Kakashi blinked. "What?"

Danzou's face was unreadable. "Go home and rest. Find me when you are feeling better. Then we will discuss the matter more closely."

Kakashi nodded numbly. "I – all right. Yes. Thanks."

Danzou smiled thinly. "No, thank _you_."

It didn't occur to Kakashi until much later that Danzou hadn't needed any guidance to find his address.

* * *

 _11 AM_.

Usually, Konoha's military hospital was marked by a solemn calm, interrupted only in the face of emergency. It maintained this air of solemnity with a quiet pride; they were known throughout the world as one of the best hospitals that had ever existed, after all.

It figured that the only other interruption to that dignified quiet would be caused by an excited Uzumaki.

Naruto tried to squirm out of Rin's arms for the third time that day. Usually, he liked to screech or employ his little baby teeth in the pursuit of freedom, but this escape attempt was marked only by little grabby hands and an impatient little chorus of "Le'go, le'go!".

Rin tightened her grip on the toddler. "You see, Kushina-nee? Didn't I tell you he is just like you?"

Kushina didn't reply. She never did. The heart monitor beeped to the rhythm of her pulse.

Rin sighed. "The nurses have clipped your hair again," she said. With the toddler in her arms once again in control, she reached out and brushed her fingers over Kushina's forehead to swipe away the now short, red hairs. "I'm sorry."

Kushina looked strangely small without her trademark mane. The nurses said looking after her was easier this way.

"Mama!" Naruto crooned, and gestured at Kushina. Rin smiled. He didn't usually recognize his mother.

"That's right. Say hello to your mom, Naruto."

"Yellow."

"Well – that's close enough. I'll let it go because it's your birthday."

"Birthday!"

"Yup. You'll never guess what we got you."

"Mama!"

"Well, yes, but – actually, you'll find out when we get home. Did I tell you you get to stay with us tonight?" Rin smiled a little and pressed a kiss in Naruto's downy blonde hair. "Wish we could keep you."

"Kashi-nii and Rin-nee?"

"That's right, Kakashi will be there as well." Rin let out a long breath. "He came home from his mission just for you." Which wasn't a total lie, so.

Good enough.

Naruto pulled on his colorful T-shirt and started to babble, having lost interest. Rin ran a hand over his head and looked back at Kushina where she lay in the hospital bed. She looked so small. Diminished. "We're still looking. We'll get you out of this," Rin said softly. "I promise."

"Promise!" Naruto parroted.

Rin chuckled wetly. "That's right. Say bye-bye to your mom now, Naruto."

"Bye-bye!"

Rin rose up slowly, hefting the toddler up with her. It was strange; as much as she hated coming here, she hated leaving even more. Two years of this. Two years of Minato sensei dead, and Kushina in a coma. Two years of watching the guilt eat at Kakashi. Feeling it gnaw at her own conscience.

Naruto was the only good thing that had come out of that day, but the parents who had so anticipated his arrival had never gotten to meet him. Instead he lived with a caretaker, a rather severe woman by the name of Ushio, because she was the only person both willing to and capable of looking after him.

The only person of age, anyway. Rin was only allowed to visit once a week. Kakashi was too, but he didn't go nearly as often. He liked Naruto, gave him piggybacks and everything, and like Rin he railed at the way some adults would speak about the boy – but Naruto looked so much like Minato.

Rin had been close with Minato. To Kakashi, Minato had been the closest thing to family he had left. He struggled, sometimes.

That, and he had been taking a lot of missions lately.

"We gonna have cake?" Naruto asked, and that was a seriously impressive sentence structure he'd made there. Rin smiled encouragingly.

"Yup."

Naruto cheered as they left the hospital.

"Got something for you," Kakashi announced, when Rin and Naruto entered the apartment. She could tell Kakashi had only just woken up from the way his hair stood on end, and the fact that he was dressed in a loose white shirt that just revealed a sliver of collarbone. There were dark circles underneath his eyes. He waved a scroll at her with one hand, and brushed Naruto's hair with the other in greeting. "Hey, big guy."

"Kashi-nii!" Naruto cheered, and then there were more grabby hands that necessitated a trade-off between the toddler and the scroll.

Rin cracked a grin as Naruto squeezed his arms around Kakashi's neck in what was either the world's smallest garrotte or a very enthusiastic hug. "What's this?" She asked, shaking the scroll.

"Open it."

Still bemused, Rin walked over to the kitchen table and unrolled the scroll. She gasped. "You – they finally gave their permission?"

Kakashi rolled his eyes. "Had to browbeat them into it, silly mutts. Go ahead and sign it. Don't want them changing their minds before you do."

Rin gave him a giddy smile. "Oh, I will! I will – I've been waiting for this for ages."

"Gift for Rin?" Naruto piped up.

Kakashi snorted. "What's this, are you using full sentences now?"

"Senseses?"

"Sentences. Rin?"

"Hmm. He's starting to use two-to-four word sentences," Rin said, still looking at the scroll. She pulled out a kunai (from where it had been duct-taped under the table – really, Kakashi) and cut at her own thumb. "Just my name and fingerprints, right?"

"Lock off your hair, too. What? It's so they have your scent. I don't make the rules," Kakashi shrugged.

Rin hummed. There were only three other names on the scroll. Hatake Kakashi, Hatake Sakumo, and a slightly more faded one she thought said Hatake Sayuri. She bit her lip. "It's still kind of a family affair. Are you sure?"

"Absolutely. Sign the damn thing."

"Damn thing!" Naruto cheered, because of course he did.

" _Kakashi_."

"Mahh mahh, sorry. Naruto, that's a bad word."

"Thing is bad?"

"No, it's – the other word, you know – you're riling me up, aren't you? You know which of those words is bad."

Rin chuckled and signed the last character of her name. The fingerprints were a little bit trickier to do, but Sanbi would heal the cuts in no time flat – it was hardly a reason not to sign a full-blown summoning contract. "Any idea who will answer?" She asked.

"A puppy, probably. They will want to test you. Pakkun and I have vouched for you, and they like you overall, but they can be a little stubborn. I think it's mostly for show at this point," Kakashi said, placing Naruto on the floor. "Look, there's some toys in the corner. You see them?"

Judging by the quick pitter patter of tiny feet that followed, yes, Naruto saw the toys. Kakashi sighed and appeared at the table. He raised one eyebrow slightly. "Well?"

Rin sighed theatrically. "Farewell, carefully cultivated luscious lock of hair," she said, and reaching up, cut a lock of hair from a place where it wouldn't be too noticeable. It wasn't particularly hard, with how long it had grown over the last year or so. She placed it on the seal, where it was promptly absorbed by the chakra paper.

Kakashi gave her an unimpressed look. "Carefully cultivated, really?"

"Well, unlike some I do actually brush it," Rin said primly.

"Ouch."

Rin bumped her shoulder into his. "Naruto's birthday party first? We can try summoning after."

His eye curved into a smile. "Sounds good."

Naruto was a very easy person to please, fortunately. He didn't mind that the cake was wobbly and the icing uneven, so in return they didn't mind when he splattered the cake with saliva trying to blow out the candle. He loved the presents too, even though they'd only been able to afford a few small things. But to Rin, the best part of the day was when the three of them sank down on the couch and shoved one of Naruto's favorite movies into the VCR. It didn't really seem to matter that Naruto fell asleep only a few minutes in.

"Did you find anything? Any hints at all?" Rin asked softly, turning the TV off.

Kakashi rubbed the back of his head. "Maybe. I – "he sighed. "I did find a lead, on my last mission."

Rin nodded. "Okay." They had found leads before. It didn't have to mean anything.

"I think she may have gone to the land of Earth," he said quietly. "Obviously, it'll be hard for us to follow her there. But you know, she can't stay there forever." She could tell there was something he wasn't telling her, but she knew he would come through eventually. He always did.

One of Kakashi's hands came up and, after brief hesitation, landed awkwardly on Rin's head, as if it couldn't quite decide between a comforting ruffle or a – well. A slightly gentler sort of gesture.

He'd been getting a little bit more awkward around her, lately. After five years, Rin didn't really want to read too much into it. So instead, she just enjoyed the warmth and size of his hand, even if the positioning was a little odd.

That was Kakashi – never quite what she wanted him to be, but always what she needed.

"Ushio-san will come for Naruto first thing tomorrow," Rin said, changing the subject.

" Ushio-san is a dirty old crone."

"She's not that bad."

"She's not good enough."

"… No. No, she's not."

* * *

Perhaps the strangest thing about the past two years was that the majority of them had been utterly normal. Dull, even, on the days where grief didn't overrule Rin's mind.

The third Hokage had taken up office again. There had been no major conflicts as the war slowly petered out into an uneasy armistice – Kiri had kept its silence. Konoha continued as it always had. As though Minato's time in office had hardly taken place at all.

His proposition to raise Academy standards and graduation ages had been quietly and effectively ignored.

Rin still rarely saw her father. She still stayed with Kakashi, because the thought of living anywhere alone was stifling. Kakashi was still a little aloof, still spent too much time training with Mikoto, still spent too much time away on missions. Continued to grow as a shinobi and a team leader, when Rin's career had essentially been put on hold.

She hadn't left the village in almost a year. Kurenai thought she was going to retire and continue on as a civilian, instead. That she just hadn't quite made her mind up yet.

As if Rin ever could.

There were burn scars on her left arm from an incident six months ago, where she had nearly lost control of Sanbi. If not for Uchiha Fugaku, she would have.

Without Minato and Kushina, training properly was nigh impossible. Fugaku did his best, but between his clan, his job and his family, as well as the fact that he wanted to keep his involvement hidden, there weren't a lot of opportunities for them to meet up and train.

She still wasn't sure why he was so secretive.

"Speaking of status, did you apply to the Hokage yet about the jonin exam?" Kakashi asked, out of the blue. He slouched down on one of the kitchen tables, tucking a small and brightly colored book away into his pockets.

Rin blinked. "No – I haven't. I doubt he would let me."

"You won't know until you try. You deserve a promotion."

"What's the point if I can't do anything with it? "Rin said defensively. She didn't particularly care for this subject. If they were never going to let her out of the village, why bother trying? She would only be disappointed.

"Then prove to them you can do it," Kakashi shrugged, because that was his modus operandi; if people doubted him, he would just keep at it until he could prove them wrong. Because of his talent, he usually succeeded.

He had gotten his promotion to captain, last month. Youngest captain since Uchiha Kagami, because Kakashi could never resist the urge to beat a record.

But Rin was no Kakashi. She was clever, yes, and she had a natural aptitude for chakra control. She could also keep a cool head in most situations – or she had been able to in the past, anyway – and Sanbi had significantly boosted her attack power.

But she had never led a team, or won a solo battle (because Sanbi counted as a separate entity, dammit, so the word solo stopped applying the moment he got involved), and her control as a jinchuuriki was meager at best.

No one had expected her to take charge before. She had been a medic, licensed to give orders when necessary, but not expected to come up with battle strategies or lead teams.

Kakashi watched her mull it over, before he sighed and looked away. "All right. Different subject. Maybe you can try summoning?"

Rin brightened. Right, the contract. She had signed it for a reason, after all. She got up, careful not to disturb Naruto, and inspected the summoning contract." So, how does it work? Do I have to use the scroll?"

Kakashi huffed. "No, just –" He lifted his hands and ran through a series of seals, too fast for her to follow. "Like that."

Rin gave him a despairing look. "Kakashi… More slowly, please."

He rolled his eye and repeated the sequence, slow enough for her to follow. Then, he raised his left hand to his mouth and mimicked biting it. "Or you can use a knife and cut yourself."

"For those of us who don't have Inuzuka ancestry," Rin agreed, smirking. Her eyes lingered briefly on Kakashi's left wrist. Without his usual ANBU gloves, she could see the awkward scarring of the skin graft he had needed after his encounter with Kuriarare. She knew the scarring was worse on his shoulder.

She shook herself out of it. If he didn't mind, she wouldn't either. Or... She would at least try not to mind. Or feel too guilty about his shoulder.

She practiced the seal sequence he had shown her twice, each time a little bit faster, until she could replicate it perfectly. Then she grabbed the kunai she had used earlier and sliced the pad of her thumb until a drop of blood welled up. Her stomach did an excited flip. "Kuchiyose no jutsu!"

Nothing happened.

Rin blinked. "I must have used the wrong dosage of chakra..." She trailed off uncertainly.

Kakashi frowned. "No, I could definitely feel _something_. I think..." He groaned unexpectedly and marched off to the bathroom.

Rin watched him go with a growing sense of befuddlement. She heard him say something else and then – a high-pitched yip followed. A moment later, Kakashi came marching out of the bathroom holding a young dog underneath its armpits. It was outrageously cute, with its oversized, pointed ears, large dark eyes and yellow and white coloring. "This is their sense of humor," Kakashi said, and nodded at the poor dog's lower body. It was dripping wet.

"Don't tell me…"

"They made her land in the toilet, yes. Har har, very funny."

Rin's hand flew to her mouth. The dog's little nose drooped sadly.

Kakashi held her out to Rin. "Go on, then."

Rin hurried forward and embraced the little dog, trying not to mind the toilet water getting in her clothes. "I'm so sorry. They didn't really like the idea of my entering a contract with you, so I suppose..?"

"Oooh, this is so embarrassing!" The dog whined. "They _told_ me I couldn't do it, and then I _did_ mess up." Her voice was high and reedy, and more than a little dramatic. "Now look at me!" She wiggled with her legs.

Rin stared at her. "Oh. Well. You could take a bath, if you like?"

Kakashi seemed to have different priorities. He rolled his eyes. "It wasn't your fault. They just gave you the wrong instructions. Always land close to your summoner, not feet away."

The dog flattened her ears in her neck, keening all the while. "I'm not very good at being a summon," she admitted. "I'm far too clumsy."

"I really need to have a chat with the boys," Kakashi growled, and stalked off.

Rin looked at the little heap of canine misery and willed herself to smile encouragingly. "You know what? Never mind all that. We've got a contract, you and I. My name is Nohara Rin. What's yours?"

The dog's ears perked up and her eyes went shiny. "Oh! Do you really mean that?" Her tail started to wag.

"Absolutely," Rin said.

"Oh, oh, oh!" The dog barked happily. "My name is Toboe! It's so very nice to meet you, Rin-chan!"

Rin smiled back. "It's nice to meet you too. Now," she clapped her hands together, "how about that bath?"

Toboe whined.

* * *

For all that Kakashi had wanted to become part of ANBU, the reality was nothing like the dream. Milestones he would once have considered victories had become little more than anti-climactic, over the past few years. He'd made it to jounin and lost a great friend. He'd made it to ANBU and lost the one man that position should have enabled him to protect. He could have been named Hokage, and still not be strong enough to actually change anything.

So his goal had become something entirely different: to find the one person capable of awakening Kushina _and_ teaching Kakashi how to minimize his greatest weakness.

Too bad Senju Tsunade was a traumatized drunk who never stayed in one place long enough for anyone to realize she was there. He could gather all the Intel he liked, take on a mission that would take him to her latest known location, and find she had already disappeared.

Even his dogs couldn't seem to pick up on her scent.

But now, perhaps he would finally have a chance.

Akino nosed at the palm of his hand. "You still mad at us, boss?"

Uhei pressed against his side. "We thought it was funny. Toboe is funny."

"But she's not a complete idiot," Pakkun said, stretching out across Bull's back. "She just needs a bit of guidance. We're not cruel. It's good practice for your girl, anyway."

"She's not _my_ girl."

Bull gave him a mournful look from where he lay on the bed.

Kakashi snorted." _Toboe_ had better not be an idiot," he grumbled. "Rin can't be compromised, you know that."

"Of course we know," Bisuke said, tongue rolling out his mouth as he panted. "We're not idiots either."

"You know, I used to believe that..." Kakashi trailed off, and grinned at the chorus of whines and angry yips this got him. He pushed himself up to his feet. "You made your bed, you sleep in it," he said. "Help Toboe, then I'll forgive you." A bit of tough love usually did the trick, where the dogs were concerned.

The dogs gave a big collective sigh, but none of them seemed particularly surprised. "All right boss." One by one, they vanished into thin air as they returned to their home world. Only Pakkun remained behind.

"We wouldn't have nominated her if she didn't have potential," he grunted. "Her hearing is phenomenal. She'll make a good sensor when she's grown."

Kakashi sighed as well. "I figured. Still, warn me next time."

The pug nodded, and then followed his brothers into the void.

Kakashi padded out his bedroom and into the living room. Naruto was still fast asleep, and from the sound of things Rin was bathing her brand-new summon. Kakashi gave an amused snort. Poor Toboe.

Still, this lull in the day was just what he needed.

He stuck his head around the bathroom door. "I have to hand in my mission report. You mind if I pop out for a moment?"

Rin shook her head. "Don't worry about us, we'll be just fine."

Kakashi threw her a salute, pulled on his sandals and grabbed the mission report. The front door fell shut behind him with a bang.

From one floor above, the landlady screeched: "Careful with those doors! You break 'em, you buy 'em!"

Kakashi sighed. He put one hand in his pocket and ambled away, taking his time to observe the village on his way to ANBU headquarters. It was a quiet day out, not too warm or too cold. Not unlike the day Naruto was born – his left eye stung sharply. No, better not go there.

He didn't run into any familiar faces until he entered headquarters through the secret entrance. Inuzuka Hige was at the desk, a smile appearing on his face as he saw Kakashi approach. He was Team Kakashi's official tracker, two or so years older than Kakashi, with a mess of long dark curls, brown eyes and cheekbones that would have made a sculptor weep. He was the kind of guy that would probably have a lead role in one of Jiraiya's novels if they ever turned them into movies. Kakashi gave him a lazy wave, not at all in the mood for his colleague's small talk, and moved on, making sure to speed up once he had rounded the corner so Hige wouldn't be able to catch him.

Handing in the papers themselves to the commander was the work of five minutes at most. Happy to have it over with, he stuffed his hands in his pockets and turned away from the commander's office to go and find Danzou.

The unfamiliar smell of sharp spices and antiseptic hit his nose, pausing him mid-step. Speak of the devil. Shimura Danzou stopped midstride and blinked.

Danzou tilted his head slightly."Hatake-kun. What a pleasant surprise."

Kakashi gave him a slight bow, as his position demanded. "Shimura-san."

"How fortuitous that we should meet again so soon. The commander told me you have been promoted recently?"

"I have, yes. Thank you for your interest." He shifted impatiently.

Danzou smiled faintly. "Quite impressive. Well done, young man. I'm sure the esteemed Yondaime-sama would have been proud of you."

Kakashi almost bit his tongue. Danzou's words sat strangely in the air between them, more loaded than they should have been." Thank you, Shimura-san," Kakashi managed.

"Of course, Minato-kun was planning to change the regulations, wasn't he? Yes – yes, that's what I seem to remember. He disapproved of placing such young men in such grave danger. But I suppose Sandaime-sama disagreed," Danzou pursed his lips as if to commiserate. "Such a shame. Just be mindful not to let it hold you back." He shrugged slightly.

"Hold me back how?" Kakashi blurted out.

"Oh – well, don't you think it odd that Sandaime would take such risks with so promising a young shinobi? Sometimes, I worry – well, never you mind." Danzou smiled again, but it was devoid of humor. "That's what I am here for. I understand your concerns, and I think I have devised a way to deal with them."

Kakashi's chest felt tight. "You have?" He tried not to sound too excited.

Danzou reached into his robes and pulled out a mission scroll. "This is a rather rare type of mission, and I can only give it to you once," he said, pulling Kakashi to the side and lowering his voice. "I will find an alternative captain for your team while you are gone and explain it to the Hokage."

"While I'm gone?"

"One month. This scroll gives you permission to leave the village for a month. Like I said; it is a rare privilege indeed. I've had to pull some strings to receive it. Use it wisely," Danzou pushed the scroll into his hands.

Kakashi's heart quickened. A month wasn't long, but it was better than anything he had had so far. "Thank you. I will," he managed. "I – how can I repay you?"

Danzou smiled that thin little smile of his. "Consider it a favor. One day, perhaps, you can pay me back. But first, go and save your friend." He pushed the scroll further into Kakashi's hands. Then, he stepped away. "Now, if you'll excuse me... Best of luck to you."

Kakashi watched him go. His fingers tightened around the scroll. He had never heard Minato sensei say anything particularly good about Danzou, but then Minato sensei wasn't here to offer him any better solutions. Besides, Danzou was doing more to save Kushina than Sandaime himself. That had to count for something.

He slipped the scroll into his pocket. He would have to prepare carefully. What would he even tell Rin?

And what had Danzou meant, earlier? Hold him back? Take risks with promising young shinobi? What had he meant?

What was Sandaime playing at?

With Danzou's words still playing through his mind, Kakashi went home, feeling almost as lightheaded as he had the previous night.

* * *

He woke up, once. Someone was shaking his shoulder. Called him, "Mizukage-sama!".

Was that his name? Was that who he was?

He couldn't open his eyes, or move his limbs. He couldn't do much of anything.

He wasn't scared either. He didn't know enough to be scared.

He just…

He just couldn't shake the feeling that he wasn't at home.

His body moved. His right eye opened. "I'm on my way," his mouth said. "Leave me."

The someone, whoever he was, did.

His body stretched. It wasn't him, who moved it. It wasn't him, who clad his mismatched limbs in dark robes.

Perhaps, he thought, as sleep once again claimed him, that should have scared him more than it did.

* * *

 **AN:**

 **Yay for sequels? I'm really enjoying this universe, you guys.** I'm setting up the plot in this chapter and it may be a bit exposition-y, but I hope you also like the fluffy interactions. Let me know what you think! **  
**

 **This story will probably be shorter than Regeneration, but if I'm still enjoying it by the time I finish I'll follow it up with more stories.**

 **Notes:**

 **Kushina is still in a coma. The shock of having the kyuubi extracted from her during childbirth only for half to be forced right back in was too big a strange even for her. Obviously, the kids are trying to find a way around this.**

 **トオボエ** _ **Tōboe**_ **, lit. "Howling". Wolf's Rain, anyone? And yes, she is a corgi.**


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2.

* * *

 _October 11th._

* * *

Drugstores had to be some kind of evil conspiracy on the part of iwagakure, intended especially to hinder people like Kakashi from being able to function properly. There was smell _everywhere_. Soaps, shampoos, facial creams, toothpaste, chemical compounds – even the makeup section offered its own array of chalky scents.

Kakashi felt mildly nauseous. He pulled the mask further over his nose, but it did little to block out the overwhelming sensory input. The faster he could get this done, the better. That was his usual drugstore strategy.

Perhaps it was the barrage of smells from that kept him from noticing her approach until it was already too late.

Rin caught Kakashi staring at two different shades of hair dye as if they held all the answers of the universe. "Errr," he said, eloquently.

Rin looked like she couldn't decide between laughter or genuine confusion. "Hi," she said. Next to her, Kurenai had a hard time keeping a straight face.

Kakashi blinked owlishly. Rin smelled faintly of Kurenai's perfume and chewing gum. She had said she would be at Kurenai's today. He had sort of assumed they would just sit around and, well, do whatever it was they did when he wasn't around. Evidently, that included shopping. Kurenai's idea, surely. Rin wasn't really the shopping kind. Was she? She never went shopping with him, which to be fair was a ridiculous thing to get indignant about.

A tall figure maneuvered himself into their isle. "Hey Rin, you really think shaving cream would – oh," Sarutobi Asuma paused midsentence. His eyes flicked from Kakashi's face to the packages in his hands. Kakashi could practically hear the gears turning in his head.

"Finally had enough of looking old, did you?" Asuma asked, only a little bit glib.

He shrugged. "Figured I'd go for a new look," he said dryly.

Asuma scowled and stuffed his hands into his pockets. "And you were thinking, what, brown or blond?"

"Mahh, bright purple seemed a bit much."

"Don't let Anko hear you say that."

Kakashi looked at packages again, then tossed the blond back onto the rack. Brown would be just fine. Might as well buy it now, since they'd already caught him in the store.

"Is it for a mission?" Kurenai asked, her ruby eyes curious. She had started to wear makeup recently, including a subtle hint of mascara and eyeliner that made her eyes pop even more. Asuma often seemed to have a hard time looking away.

Not Rin, though. Her laughter faded when she heard the word 'mission' and her eyes grew keen.

Kakashi smiled faintly. "If I told you, I would have to kill you!" He said cheerfully.

Asuma rolled his eyes again, but there wasn't as much fire behind it. "Right, right. Top secret?"

"Something like that." Kakashi shrugged again. "What were you guys doing here, anyway?"

The girls exchanged a look. "Just getting some essentials," Rin said. "Then we ran into Asuma."

Asuma grew faintly pink. Kakashi glanced at Rin's basket. Female hygiene products. Ahh, the true mystery of life. Ever since Rin had moved in, they seemed to have overtaken his bathroom. Well, overtaken – there was a discreet little box in the corner somewhere. He'd been quite shocked, at the ripe old age of fourteen. Now, he usually knew when to get Rin chocolate.

He hummed. "Better get to the counter then, right?"

They paid for their things and left the store, which left them in the awkward position of trying to figure out what to do next. Rin was friends with Kurenai, and Kurenai was friends with Asuma, and Kakashi was friends with Rin but not sure of where he stood with either of the others. He hadn't had an awful lot of time for socializing the past year. Rin had the house to herself most of the time.

"We – we could go down to the river? It's a lovely day, for October," Rin suggested. "We could get cinnamon buns at the bakery –" she blinked, then paled a little at her own suggestion.

Kakashi hesitated too. Not just for Rin's sake, although that played a part – the thing was that he hadn't exactly bought the hair dye to play hairdresser. No, he needed it. If he was going to leave the country, he had better do it as unrecognizable as possible.

The nearest bakery in town was _Nohara's Baked Goods_. An excellent little confectionary, even after the proprietor had lost a hand when his house collapsed in the Kyuubi attack. The proprietor, who was Rin's father. Who had _assumed_ the village would take care of her, after she was made into a jinchuuriki. They had only spoken a few times over the past few years.

"If you are sure," Kurenai said, a little concerned. "I know you and your dad aren't on great terms..."

Kakashi blinked in surprise, and then felt stupid for it. Of course she knew they were on bad terms; how else would Rin have explained that she had moved out of her dad's house? What excuse had she given Kurenai? A bad argument? _Irreconcilable differences_? He was being particularly slow today.

Rin squared her shoulders and lifted her chin. "I'm sure," she said, although when Asuma and Kurenai turned to leave she waited briefly to mutter, "He might not even be in today."

Kakashi bumped his shoulder against hers. "You could wait outside. They won't even notice."

Rin's jaw clenched. After a moment, she nodded. "Thanks."

"Don't mention it."

They left the bakery some fifteen minutes later, each of them with their own cinnamon bun, and headed for the river. Rin had been correct – her father hadn't been in. He didn't work full days anymore and usually had help in the store, but Rin was still visibly happy to be away from the bakery. The further they got, the more involved she got with Kurenai and Asuma's ongoing conversation. Kakashi, for his part, didn't much feel the need to participate. He was perfectly happy to amble after them and pretend, for a moment, that any of them were ordinary teenagers.

They weren't, of course. Asuma and Kurenai were just better at pretending.

They took off their boots and waded through the river, which finally restored Rin's smile. The water was cool and pleasant on Kakashi's skin, and he smiled along when Kurenai asked Rin to show Asuma some of her water jutsu. If he was going to let himself be distracted, it might as well be by a good show.

Rin was happy to comply. It wasn't long before water spiraled through the air around them, weaving through their legs or circling around their heads, or even briefly taking the shape of an animal or a star. A couple of civilians on the banks noticed and watched the display, cheering or clapping at a particularly good bits.

Rin looked radiant when she smiled. She didn't smile enough, Kakashi decided. He was almost willing to thank Sanbi for letting her do this now without fear of reprisal.

Still, when a couple of the kids from the waterside started to chase after her creations to catch them and Asuma laughed just a little bit too hard when one of them fell face first into water, Kakashi was more than happy to join the party with a five foot wave of his own.

What? He thought it was funny.

Rin was still grinning when she resurfaced. For a moment her eyes seemed to shine. They looked almost golden in the sunlight. Then her grin turned wicked and her next little water trick ended up in Kakashi's face.

Well. Fair enough.

The water fight continued only for a few more minutes, after which it began to occur to them that it was _October_ and nearly twilight and all of them were soaking wet. It was way. Too. Cold.

"No fuss. You guys could come with me. I've got plenty of dry clothes, and we could make dinner after. The old man won't be home until late," Asuma said.

"Ahh," Kakashi wanted to say no and go home, to his own comfortable clothes and books and the vegetables he had intended to turn into a soup for tonight, but Rin looked so happy…

"That sounds wonderful!" She said, "thank you, Asuma-kun."

After a moment, Kakashi sighed. "Sure. Thanks for your hospitality."

Rin smiled even brighter. Kurenai gave him an approving look as well, which made him wonder what she would have them if he had rejected the offer.

Asuma gave them a lazy smile. "'Kay. Be warned, I'm not much of a cook. My sister tries to teach me, but it won't seem to stick. And now that she has her baby, I'm not sure she remembers I exist." He chuckled.

"Oh! She has already given birth?" Rin exclaimed, who clearly knew more than Kakashi did. Asuma had a sister?

"It's a boy. _Konohamaru_ , if you'll believe it. A little bit on the nose," Kurenai said, raising one of her eyebrows.

Asuma grinned. "An unsubtle name for an unsubtle kid. Man, he screams. But then I guess you guys are used to that, what with –" he trailed off a little uncertainly. "What's he called again?"

Kurenai elbowed him.

"Naruto," Kakashi said. "He never screamed."

Or cried, or fussed. He'd been a very quiet sort of baby. Imagine their surprise when his toddler personality came out the way it did.

"Right, yeah," Asuma said, a little uncomfortable. "That's what it was."

Given who his father was, Asuma probably knew just what Naruto was. Wouldn't be the first time the Hokage had slipped him more information than his rank entitled him to, even if Asuma was up for jounin as well. Kakashi would complain, except Minato had done exactly the same thing with him and Rin. Even someone like the Hokage needed someone to vent to, and after he had lost his wife to the Kyuubi Asuma was probably the only person he saw every day.

Asuma didn't talk about his mom much. Neither did Kurenai talk about her father. The cloud that seemed to hang over their conversation all of a sudden, however, made it abundantly clear that the way they had died was far from forgotten.

"It's not his fault," Rin said softly. "You have to know that." She didn't meet their eyes, which wasn't like her – Rin always made eye contact when she spoke to people – but then Kakashi knew exactly why she was avoiding them. Neither Kurenai or Asuma knew she was a jinchuuriki too.

Either way, her words seemed to startle Asuma. "Yeah – no, I know that," he said, sounding a little defensive. "He's just a kid."

Kurenai said nothing.

The mood remained a little downtrodden until they reached Asuma's home – better known as the Hokage mansion. Kakashi had only been inside the entrance hallway, but never any further. The place was, well, _grand_. It was more modern than most of the compounds, with stark paint walls and polished wooden floors. The walls were decorated with numerous _nindo_ – ninja mottos – from famous Konoha shinobi like the Nidaime. His read 心・技・体, _Shin – gi – tai_. Mind, technique, body. It had been one of Kakashi's favorites as a child. Now, it just seemed cold.

As they moved further in, he saw photographs of the past Hokage and one of Sarutobi and his wife, some ten years younger, her holding a young Asuma while their teenaged daughter stood next to Sarutobi. A second picture showed that same daughter holding an infant and looking overjoyed. Asuma's sister looked a lot like him.

"Your dad is such a nice man, and yet I sometimes still have difficulty imagining him as a parent," Rin said, voicing Kakashi's thoughts.

Kurenai smiled. "You haven't seen him knitting sweaters yet, clearly."

"Pff. He's all right, I guess," Asuma said fondly, and led them to his room. It was a remarkably clean and organized space, for a teenage boy. It didn't seem much like Asuma, but then given that this was the Hokage's home they probably had cleaners or servants or something to do it for him. It even smelled a little like cleaning fluid. Asuma opened his wardrobe and tossed a hoodie at Kakashi. It was bright red. "Sorry, don't have any spare masks."

Kakashi shrugged, and turned his back towards the girls to unceremoniously pull his wet tank top off. He briefly hesitated over the mask, but then he saw a scarf lying around on the floor and picked it up. "This clean?" He asked, turning around just long enough to see that while Asuma was tossing close at them the girls were both watching Kakashi instead.

He frowned, and they both looked away as fast as lightning. Weird.

Asuma peered past them to squint at the scarf. "Oh, yeah. That's fine."

Kakashi turned his back towards them again and pulled off the wet mask as well. Then he pulled on the hoodie and wrapped the scarf around his face. Rin's mouth did that funny little quirk it did when she was about to laugh at him.

Kurenai and Rin shuffled off to the bathroom as Asuma quickly changed out of his own wet clothes. They hung everything up to dry and then went to the kitchen together.

It was awkward. Neither of them knew what to say.

Kakashi decided on, "Thanks." He pulled on the sleeve of the hoodie.

"You're welcome."

Another silence. The girls sure took long to change their clothes.

"Hey, you know I didn't mean it like that, right?" Asuma burst out suddenly. "About the – about Naruto."

Kakashi tilted his head, curious to see where Asuma would take this.

Asuma ran a hand through his hair. "I know he's just a kid. It's not his fault that he's also..."

"That he's also what?" Kakashi asked softly.

"Well, you know." Asuma hopped onto the counter. He suddenly looked much younger, even with the stubble he had managed to grow. "A... Jinchuuriki."

"That's just a small part of who he is."

"Oh, yeah, obviously. 'Course. And I mean, it wasn't even his choice," Asuma said, sounding jittery. "Dad says it's unfair to, y'know, judge anyone for it. They don't usually get to choose, do they?"

Kakashi managed not to wince. "No, they usually don't."

At least, he told himself, Asuma was trying. Many people didn't bother.

"You do have some food in the fridge, don't you?" Kurenai asked, as she and Rin entered the room. They were both dressed in rather oversized sweaters and what Kakashi was pretty sure were old pajama bottoms. Asuma was taller than Kakashi and still growing steadily. He had already outstripped his father with ease and was wider than even Gai in the shoulders.

Now, Kurenai was of pretty average height and posture, perhaps even on the tall side, but Rin...

Well.

Rin raised her hands. They were hard to see within her sleeves. She pouted at Kakashi. "Don't laugh," she told him, as she began to roll her sleeves up. Her feet looked tiny underneath the flannel checkered pants.

Rin was struggling to make it past 5'1.

"You should drink more milk," Kakashi said.

Rin punched his shoulder. Well, at least she could reach it.

He decided to save that thought to himself. Probably safer that way.

Asuma set them all to work on preparing their meal. It was a little weird to picture the Hokage puttering around in this kitchen, but apparently he did. "He really likes chocolate milk," Asuma said, by ways of explanation. Like that was any easier to picture.

The meal itself was all right, with mostly Kurenai and Rin keeping the conversation going as they ate. Every now and then Rin would throw Kakashi curious looks. She would have questions later – she was too sharp not to notice that his buying hair dye was unusual. If he really needed some for a mission, it would ordinarily have been provided for him. ANBU hardly went around sending its agents into drugstores whenever they needed a disguise.

The other two ought to know. It wasn't much of a secret amongst their peers that he was ANBU. People tended to notice when the boy considered to be the most talented of their generation seemed to stop taking missions. Perhaps they hadn't all connected the dots..?

Or, a more malicious little voice said, they just don't think of you often enough to wonder. The hand holding his chopsticks paused mid-movement as he considered it. He wasn't a particularly good friend, but he would have had to be a monster not to mind the idea that people might not care.

He pinched his thigh underneath the table and continued to eat. Self-pity was a hideous quality.

* * *

Rin hardly let Kakashi out of her sight all evening. Something was off about him, and she was willing to bet it had to do with that hair dye. He wouldn't stop drumming his fingers on the table during dinner, as if there was something he wanted to say or do so badly that it nearly cost him more energy to just sit still and have dinner with friends.

Rin wasn't a fool. She knew Kakashi didn't enjoy socializing the way she did. None of it came naturally to him, and he often struggled when he had to be in the company of people outside their team for more than an hour or so. The fact that he had today made her feel weirdly proud of him, even though she had done nothing to make him try.

Because she wasn't a fool, she also knew that although Kakashi might consider Asuma and Kurenai friends of the sort, he would never confide in them. Whatever he was planning existed only in _his_ mind. Rin suspected that she was probably the only person in the world who could get him to talk when he had a secret.

It would have made her feel sad for him, were it not for the fact that she could count the number of people who knew about her own status on one hand, one of whom was in a coma, one she never saw, and one who spoke only in terms of 'control' and 'safety' rather than being concerned for her well-being.

It made her stomach twist whenever she thought about poor Kurenai, who had no idea that one of her closest friends was a jinchuuriki. The thought of what she might do if she knew had left Rin sleepless often enough.

But with Kaka willshi, she could talk about – well, most things. Not quite everything, but very nearly. She trusted him. So, she couldn't help but feel she deserved a bit of trust in return.

She waited until they were back home.

"You should try summoning Toboe again, make sure she gets used to you –" Kakashi said, just as Rin asked: "Why are you going to dye your hair?"

They stood just inside the hallway, their boots still in their hands. There was no surprise in Kakashi's good eye. He sighed, and dropped his boots. When they hit the ground, he kicked them against the wall – a fairly typical bit of Hatake housekeeping – and nodded. "I was going to tell you," he said.

Rin folded her arms across her chest. He sounded… Uncertain. That was unusual for him. "I know," she said. "Will you tell me now?"

Something in his face lightened a little. "Come on, then. I don't really feel like explaining it in the hallway."

Rin followed him into her the kitchen, which was their usual location for discussions and, really, any conversation of a more serious nature. It was more comfortable somehow to remain standing when they might disagree. Rin realized she was still embracing herself and reluctantly let go. She was sure he could read her worry on her face anyway.

Kakashi pulled out the package of hair dye. "Do you know how this stuff works?" He turned the box around in his hands before opening it and pulling out several items. "There's gotta be some kind of instruction manual, right?"

"There has to be," Rin agreed. "But you haven't explained –"

"We've got an opportunity to find her," Kakashi interrupted her, briefly meeting her eyes. His voice came out uncharacteristically strong, as though a fire had been lit inside of him and fueled the much slower near-drawl he had been cultivating for the past two years.

"Her… Do you mean Tsunade?" Heat rushed through Rin's body when he nodded, along with blinding, stupid hope. "Really? How?" It was too good to be true. It had to be.

"I've got permission to leave the village for a month so I can go look for her. With the lead I got earlier, and the dogs... I stand a pretty good chance." Kakashi rocked back on his heels, his brow furrowed a little in what she recognized as excitement. Oh, he couldn't wait to leave, could he?

Well, neither could she. "We. We stand a pretty good chance," she said, balling her fists.

Kakashi faltered. "But – are you sure – they won't allow you to –"

"I'm sure. I'm not staying behind ever again, especially not for this. I couldn't help when the Kyuubi attacked, but I can help now. And, and frankly," she flushed red, "I-I'd like to see them try to stop me."

Kakashi blinked back at her. "Huh. You'd think at some point I would stop getting surprised when you go all rebel on me, but this isn't it."

Rin flushed deeper. "I will rebel when their rules are dumb," she muttered, and pushed down the instinctive shame and desire to make herself smaller than she was.

After a beat, Kakashi began to chuckle. He didn't have a very dignified or charming sort of laugh, and after two years of living with him Rin had begun to associate it with him reading his ridiculous little books. She flushed even deeper and resisted the urge to laugh along. She liked his dumb laugh.

"Mahh, if I can keep recommending you for the jounin exams it would be kind of hypocritical to say you can't come now, wouldn't it?" He said, running a hand through his hair. It had been a bit limp after their water fight, but now it stood up again in its usual impossible peaks.

Rin pushed her chest out. It didn't do much to make her look more like jounin-material, but it made her feel a bit tougher. "Well, quite," she said, sounding nowhere near as confident as she wanted to. She cleared her throat. "Now, that hair dye – what on earth are you going to do with it?"

"It's a disguise," Kakashi said. "I can't be sure that I'm in any bingo books, but if I am…" He shrugged. "The lead led to Earth Country. We may not be at war anymore, but they will hardly take kindly to any Konoha shinobi crossing their borders."

Rin blinked. "Yeah, that's a good point." She tilted her head a little and tried to picture Kakashi with brown hair. It was a weird image. "But what about –" everything else, she didn't say, "– your eye?"

He narrowed his good eye out for a little, as if he could guess what she had been about to say. "Civilians have eye patches, right?"

"I... Suppose."

"Or scars."

"Generally not scars that look like that," Rin said, a little dubious. She pictured his scar in her mind, as it stretched from below his cheekbone to above his eyebrow. It had paled but the skin around it seemed oddly stretched, particularly around the cheekbone. After four years Rin had grown used to the sight, but there was no mistaking it for anything other than a battle wound.

She tapped a finger to her chin. "You'd need some kind of makeup to cover it up," she said, ignoring the trepidation on his face. "I'm sure we could find something. And contact lenses, perhaps, for me. And I'll forgo my markings," she added, brushing the purple marks on her cheeks. She would feel a bit naked without them, but that was all right. "And your mask. It'll have to go," she said sternly.

Kakashi grimaced. "Figures masks wouldn't have caught on with civilians," he muttered. "I can get a scarf."

Rin managed not to sigh. She loved it when he didn't wear his mask. He had a lovely face. "Did you get some clothes, too?"

"I have some from a mission a while back. They will do."

"Then all that's left is coming up with a cover story," she said.

"Oh, that's easy," Kakashi said, "when my hair is brown we could pass for siblings, if you don't look too closely." He smiled brightly and, humming under his breath, moved past her towards his bedroom.

He didn't notice Rin's dismay at all.

Siblings, _I ask you_ , Rin sighed.

 _Oh kid, don't I know it,_ Sanbi rumbled, commiserate, and in doing so nearly sent Rin jumping through the roof in surprise.

* * *

 **AN**

 _ **How we could be heroes/just for one day**_

 _ **I/I can remember/standing/standing by the wall**_

 _ **and the guns/shout above our heads/and we kiss/as though nothing could fall.**_

 _ **And the shame/the shame is on the other side/**_

 **Help I can't stop listening to Peter Gabriel's version of 'Heroes' bc what a Regeneration mood/**

 **I got some bad news this week so comments are extra welcome!**


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3.**

* * *

"Where you going?" Naruto's voice was all curiosity and no trepidation when he saw Rin's backpack. He was already dressed in his pajamas for the night, and his cheeks were rosy with sleep.

Rin's smile was a bit wobbly as she crouched before him and ran a hand through his soft hair. Behind him, Ushio watched their interactions like a hawk. Even Kakashi's stony glare seemed to do little to scare her off, as though she wanted to be sure they wouldn't run off with either her young charge or any of the horribly tacky wall decorations that littered her hallway.

"We're going on a little field trip," Rin said, looking into Naruto's bright blue eyes. Her eyes stung a little. "You don't have to worry, but it means we might not be able to visit you for a while."

Naruto frowned. He reached out and fiddled with her sleeve. "A while?"

"A month," Kakashi said, more for Ushio's benefits than Naruto's. The little boy didn't understand time measurements yet.

"It'll be over before you know it, I promise," Rin said. "Just like when Kakashi goes away sometimes."

Naruto looked down. "Don't like it," he mumbled.

"When we get back, we'll ask Ushio-san if you can come and sleep over at our place, how does that sound?" Kakashi said, which was a fine bit of bribery. He was still glaring at Ushio, whose face twitched and hardened. Then, she gave a curt nod.

Rin resisted the urge to sigh. Ushio wasn't a bad person by any means, but Kakashi seemed unable to see her as anything but. She was hardened by the shinobi life, yes, and by the loss of her husband and her eldest son, but she wasn't cruel. She kept Naruto fed and clothed, and never once talked to him as though he was the demon himself. She had even made an effort to teach him colors and shapes.

She didn't give him as much affection as he needed, though. Naruto was a very affectionate child. Sometimes, when he was with Rin and Kakashi, he would stand close to either of them and grab their clothes with one little hand in an obvious bid for affection, but never quite dare to meet their eyes.

Kakashi's obvious dislike for Ushio's practices made Rin wonder if he had had similar experiences in the orphanage where he had briefly lived after his father's death. If nothing else, he was the shining example of how it might affect a child to not have the love and support of a parent. He was self-aware enough to know it, too, Rin thought.

She brushed Naruto's cheek again. "Would you like that? You could stay a whole day, and then a night, and then the morning after too."

He nodded slowly. He was still pouting, and perhaps he would cry a little when they left, but he was still a two-year-old with a very limited capacity for either remembering sad encounters or understanding the passage of time. By the time they came back, he would hardly understand they had been gone for much longer than usual. It was a bittersweet comfort.

Beside her, she could hear Kakashi take a deep breath before he too crouched down and gently flicked Naruto's nose. He gave him his brightest smile, the one that made his eyes crinkle and Rin's stomach flip. "We'll have all the cookies and ice cream you can eat," he promised.

More bribery. He was a terrible enabler.

Ushio looked mildly scandalized. Naruto cheered loudly.

Later, after several very tearful hugs in which Naruto managed to smear snot and tears all over Kakashi's shirt – but blessedly, not Rin's, which earned her a glare from Kakashi – the two teenagers left.

"We'd better get this right," Kakashi said softly. He kicked at a rock, hands in his pockets, and for a moment he looked just like the sullen kid he'd been back when Obito was still alive. "He depends on it."

Before she could really question it, Rin reached out and squeezed his elbow. "We will. And if not this month, then some other time. We will take care of him."

Their eyes met. After a moment, Kakashi nodded. "It's a promise."

By unspoken agreement, their next stop was at the hospital, where they held Kushina's hands and made her that very same promise.

* * *

Their cover story, much to Rin's covert disappointment, was that they were twins looking for their aunt after they had lost their parents in a tragic and entirely unexpected accident.

That was closer to the truth than either of them liked, but Kakashi said that that would only make it easier for them to uphold the lie.

They left early in the morning so that there wouldn't be anyone in the streets to recognize either of them. The guard let them through the gates without too much fuss, content just to see their IDs and permission slip. For once, the secrecy surrounding Rin's status was a boon.

Still, Rin's nerves plagued her for the first fifty-odd miles. Part of her kept expecting a patrol to appear out of nowhere and send them back, but it kept not happening. It helped that Kakashi led her past one of the lesser used routes to the north and regularly made sure to scatter their tracks, but chances were no one had even realized she had left.

Rin just hoped that wasn't too naïve.

They made camp just as twilight set in, near the foot of a monumental mountain. The terrain was gorgeous, this far north-west into Fire Country, with deciduous trees slowly making place for pine as the mountain ranges steadily rose in height.

Rin was overjoyed to finally see something other than Konoha's buildings, which were familiar and beloved but also stifling if they became the only thing you ever saw. The fresh mountain air felt delicious in her lungs, and although her legs ached a little from the sudden exercise, she was glad to be moving.

She was still smiling when she built the campfire, during twilight.

Kakashi caught her eye and raised his eyebrows a little. "Glad to be away, huh?"

"Oh yes, very much so."

"It'll be good for you." Kakashi shrugged off his back pack and tossed her a packet of dried meat. "Nothing too exciting to eat. In case you've forgotten mission rations."

Rin scowled. "I have not, unfortunately."

They settled into a comfortable silence as they rested their weary legs and ate. Kakashi called up two of his dogs to stand watch. The dogs curled up against them, their eyes and ears still alert. Their warm bodies and trademark dog scent felt comforting as forest around them slowly grew darker.

"What do we do, if Sanbi comes out?" Kakashi asked suddenly, his eyes on the fire.

Rin stilled. It was a reasonable question, of course, but it highlighted her lack of control over the demon. She looked down at her hands. If she pushed up her sleeves, she would be able to see the dark seals covering her skin. They wouldn't have been visible, if her seals hadn't needed so many amendments to turn her from a time bomb into a permanent container.

"I... Brought these," she said eventually, pulling two pieces of paper from her backpack. "They're the last seals Minato sensei made for me." She handed them over.

Kakashi held them carefully between his hands, following one of the ink lines with his finger. "I remember these. You use them to train, right? Before..."

"Yes. They should dampen Sanbi's chakra for long enough for you to knock me out."

Kakashi's eyes flitted over the seal. "It's a very clever design. I'm not sure, but… I think, with some time, I should be able to replicate them. Why didn't you give them to me before?"

Rin winced. "I'm sorry."

Kakashi sighed. "Mahh, that's not really an answer," he said, steady but gentle.

Rin wrung her hands together. "It's… It's silly. I suppose I didn't want to give them away, because... They're one of the last things sensei gave me before he..."

Kakashi's eyes softened. He rummaged around in his waist pack and pulled out a familiar looking three-pronged kunai and held it into the light. "I get that." He put it back into the pack.

They slept uneasily that night.

* * *

Once they crossed the border of Grass Country, they quickly checked into an inn to undergo their transformation.

Rin pouted at herself in the mirror of their designated room. The contact lenses were powder blue. They made her look like her father. She sighed and glanced to the left, where Kakashi was inspecting himself as well.

Well, his hair was brown, all right. The color had taken well. It had also inexplicably caused his hair to curl up. Kakashi pulled at one of the curls and frowned as it bounced back. "Is this supposed to happen?" He grimaced.

"Not… Really, no."

"Hnn."

"Your hair has never been very good at obeying the laws of nature," Rin tried. She had to fight not to smile.

"Not helpful."

"On the upside, it does make you even more unrecognizable."

"I look weird."

"... By most people's standards, you look more normal now than before."

"Oi!"

He lightly swatted at her head. Rin grinned and dodged the blow. "Maybe I should curl my hair as well," she added.

Kakashi squinted at her. Between the hair, the eyepatch and the uncovered face, Rin suspected even their friends wouldn't recognize him. "I feel like you're having me on, somehow."

"I would never."

"You know, you may have convinced people you are some kind of sweet and innocent girl, but deep down, you're as evil as I am."

Rin's face heated up at the word 'sweet', but she was determined not to let on. "Well, out of the two of us, you're not the one carrying a demon around," she said.

Kakashi stared at her. "Did you just joke about Sanbi? You just joked about Sanbi."

All right, now she was blushing. "Well, if I don't, who will? Anyway! We need fake names."

Kakashi stared at her for a little bit longer before snorting and turning back to the mirror. Even his scar was covered up, thanks to a particularly determined foundation (doubtlessly intended for women of a certain age trying to cover up their wrinkles). He frowned. "Sukea," he said, and nodded at himself.

Now it was Rin's turn to stare. "Su- Sukea. You – what."

"You can be Kurou."

"Neither of those are names."

"Technically, neither is Kakashi."

"That's a terrible excuse."

"Blame my parents."

Rin decided now would be a good time for the earth to swallow her up, or something. Even that would be less absurd than this conversation. "I'm not going to use Kurou. That's not even a girl's name."

"So you admit that it's a name," Kakashi said obtusely.

The need to cuff him over the head grew. "All right, Sukea. So our 'parents' are into weird names. How about... How about I go with Rei?" She said, just barely managing to keep her hands to herself.

"That's not a weird name."

"I'll use the kanji for 'ghost'."

"Okay, that's a little weird."

"Rei and Sukea... What about a surname?" Rin asked.

"Nobe," Kakashi said, after a moment's thought. "Your last name means field, my last name means field, Nobe means field. It makes sense."

"No one would ever guess it's us," Rin deadpanned.

Kakashi beamed.

* * *

Traveling through Grass Country was nowhere near as pleasant as traveling through Fire Country had been, and not just because they had had to seal up their shinobi clothes and headbands and trade them for plain civilian garb.

No.

Rin and Kakashi looked at the endless plains and waving grass and could remember only fighting, and long nights spent in terror of being discovered by the enemy whenever Minato sensei was away.

It was also the country were Obito had died.

They wouldn't have to travel past Kannabi Bridge, which was a small blessing. Still, they were both quiet and borderline morose, even when they passed by small farming villages which were finally, visibly, recovering from the war. Children were laughing again, and the adults could do their jobs without having to worry about running into any shinobi. They weren't quite at the point where they would be happy to greet strangers yet, but Rin knew it was only a matter of time. The world was kinder here, now that the war had ended.

Sometimes, though, that was hard to remember. Particularly in the forests, which unlike northern Fire Country's largely deciduous foliage, more closely resembled the Giant's Forests to Konoha's South, known for their humongous plant and animal life. Even the mushrooms were the size of houses. If she focused, she could sense the enormous quantities of water running through the trees, like the forest's lifeblood.

"Legend has it one of the first shinobi to have ever existed came here, and infused the earth itself with his chakra," Minato sensei had once told them, back when Obito was still alive and Kakashi still a stranger. "As a result, the plants and animals just grew and grew and grew, until they were strong enough to survive just about anything. Woods like these are dangerous, and you must always remain on guard when you find yourself in one."

And they had been on guard. It just hadn't been enough.

Even the dogs were uneasy in the forest.

Nonetheless, Rin summoned Toboe. "I want you to listen very carefully," she said, when the little dog appeared. "I'm not expecting any enemies, but the creatures here are large and dangerous. It will be good practice for you to try and detect them before they detect us."

Tomoe nodded, her little face very serious. She didn't speak at all, and even the other two dogs gave her approving looks when she began to sniff around, her large ears pitched forward.

"You should train genin someday," Kakashi said. "I bet you would be good at it."

Rin smiled. "I – actually, I'd been thinking I might teach at the Academy. Obviously I would need some training, and the Hokage's permission, but if they're not going to let me take missions very often… It would be nice to have something to focus on."

Kakashi blinked. "That – yeah. I guess – that would be great," he said, awkwardly.

Rin laughed. "We don't all want to be Hokage," she said, smiling at him. "Or ANBU commander, or whatever it is you're aiming for. A smaller ambition is still ambition."

He floundered for a moment. "Uhh, yeah – sure. I guess you would have gone into the hospital, otherwise..? Become a surgeon, or something?"

Rin's smile faded a little. "That was my dream, yes."

"You could still go into research," Kakashi said hesitantly.

Rin shrugged. "Eventually, perhaps. What I really want is to help people directly. Teaching children would be a pretty good way to do that, don't you think? If I could influence the next generation even a little..."

They looked up as a flock of birds dove out of the branches overhead and winged away under loud protest. Toboe was at the foot of their tree, barking enthusiastically.

"Not... Quite what I had in mind," Rin managed.

Kakashi snorted, and then whistled sharply. His dogs turned their heads to look at him only once, before they trotted over to Toboe and started talking to her in soft tones. "They will mentor her a little," Kakashi explained. "Teach her how to distinguish the sounds and scents of harmless wildlife from the big and dangerous ones."

Rin grimaced. "I suppose I can't teach her that."

"Well, there's no reason why she shouldn't have more than one teacher."

Rin smiled. They kept moving.

"I'm not really aiming to be Hokage, you know," Kakashi said after a while.

"I know."

"I know people have… expectations of me, as the... so-called prodigy of my generation. Especially since sensei died."

Rin turned her head to look at him, but he was on her right, and therefore harder to read even without the mask. She thought about it. Sandaime would be sixty, soon. He would need replacement before long, but how many people were in the village right now who were actually suitable?

Only the Sannin could match him for strength, and they were scattered across the earth – and no one would trust Orochimaru, after his laboratories had been found last year.

"I'd like to say you can be anything you want, but I don't think you would believe me," she said.

He shrugged. "Probably not."

"If it helps, it's not like they'll make you Hokage unless you're really ready for it."

"You mean, when I'm not known for scaring off genin and terrorizing teammates?" He looked at her long enough to show her his raised eyebrow.

Rin laughed. "You haven't terrorized your teammates in, oh, at least a week."

He smiled back. He had faint dimples. "It won't matter either way if I don't become strong enough. And I don't know if I will."

Rin raised her eyebrows. "If you don't find a way, I don't know who will."

"You have too much faith in me," he replied, but it didn't sound as lighthearted as before.

Perhaps he really was worried he would never be strong enough. How hard it had to be, to set yourself such impossible goals and yet be reluctant to take on the consequences that such power might bring with it.

"You don't have to be the best," Rin said. "Screw expectations."

Kakashi hummed thoughtfully. "... I don't really want to be some disgraced legend's mediocre kid," he admitted. "If I... Show people what I can do, but still follow in my father's footsteps, perhaps they'll see that he was..." He shrugged. "It's a stupid ambition."

"You want to change people's minds about your father," Rin realized.

"Yup. And good luck with that," he smiled wryly. "People hate that guy."

Rin's stomach twisted at hearing him describe his father in such a way. She didn't really remember Hatake Sakumo, but she knew Kakashi had adored him. That, and anyone willing to go to such lengths for other people had to have been a good person.

"I'm sorry," she said.

"'S not as bad as it used to be. Either way, I'm used to it."

The only reason it's not as bad as it used to be is because he died, Rin thought. Out of sight, out of heart. It made her heart ache.

"It's not stupid. Your ambition. But, you shouldn't have to prove anything to them," she said.

"Yeah, well. They're still my neighbors," Kakashi said, a strange dark humor creeping into his voice.

Before Rin could respond, one of the dogs, who had gone ahead of them, gave a long howl. The sound was eerie in the otherwise quiet forest, and Toboe quickly scarpered over to Rin's side to press against her leg. Her little body shook.

The two shinobi tensed as soon as they heard the noise, casting out their chakra to sense for other presences. Neither of them were sensors, but between Rin's chakra control and Kakashi's sharp hearing and sense of smell, they could sense a pretty decent area around themselves.

"Animal," Kakashi whispered. "Big."

Toboe keened softly.

They didn't move, their every sense focused on the forest around them. The lack of bird calls now seemed like an obvious giveaway, but Rin was sure they had still been there a mere minute ago.

Rustling leaves to the right set them both on edge, but it was only one of Kakashi's dogs, an older female. "It's a bear, roughly the size of Kurohiko," she said, in hushed tones. Who or what Kurohiko was apparently didn't warrant an explanation. "She's caught onto your scent ready."

"Any cubs?" Kakashi asked. The dog shook her head.

"Kurohiko?" Rin asked.

"Big name in the dog world. Not as big as sensei's toads, but bigger than any normal bear," Kakashi replied. "Chakra sensitive, too. Let's keep moving, but very quietly. Ao, lead the way," he added, nodding towards his dog.

Ao could move faster and quieter on her four legs than either the humans or Toboe, but she paced herself enough that they could keep her within sight. Kakashi cast a light illusion that would make the light reflect differently around them, making them much harder to see.

The first thing Rin heard as they neared was the bear's breathing, loud and a little irregular as she sniffed her surroundings. Next to Rin, Kakashi wrinkled his nose as if he was smelling something particularly foul.

They could probably beat her, if they really had to, but the chances of accidental injury or discovery by other shinobi were too great. That, and the bear wasn't malicious – she was just a bear, rummaging around in her forest. There was no need to kill her.

A branch snapped to her left, as loud as an explosion. Rin spun on her heel , chakra at the ready -

Toboe hunched her shouldersin an attempt to make herself as small as possible. Her tail was tucked firmly between her had broken the branch. Rin should have carried her.

The bear snorted loudly. Her dark eyes pierced through the shadows, as if they could see straight through Kakashi's illusion.

She sniffed again, curious. Kakashi's right hand twitched near his hidden kunai holster.

The bear snorted again , and then bent her head down and resumed her meal.

"A bee's nest," Kakashi whispered ."I didn't smell it right away."

Ao moved again, and the shinobi followed, Toboe tucked neatly into Rin's arms.

They passed the bear by without too much trouble, after that. Ao knew how to guide them past her without too much of a detour, so they were quickly under way. They camped at the border of the forest, where Kakashi made sure to burn the papers Danzou had given them and check over their fake identifications instead.

They weren't a day too late; they reached Kusa territory not long after, and were stopped several times on the road by patrolling Kusa shinobi who asked them for their papers. Unlike Konoha or the other bigger villages, Kusa didn't directly cooperate with their country's Daimyo, so their protectorate didn't encompass the entirety of their country. Civilian immigrants were common enough, so they were allowed to keep on moving every time.

There was even one particularly friendly young chunin, barely five years older than them, who insisted on escorting them through a number of pastures that were known for being bandit terrain. He chattered to them all the while. Rin thought it was sweet, and was happy to practice her fake background story by answering his many questions. Kakashi, if nothing else, seemed to enjoy playing the mulish teenage brother trying to look out for his sister. The chunin even waved them goodbye as they split ways, unaware that the two harmless teenagers he had just escorted could have beaten him quite easily. Kakashi didn't stop laughing for several minutes.

Now that they were forced to move at a civilian pace, it took a lot longer to cross Grass Country. Kakashi sent his second dog ahead to scout the nearby towns and hopefully bring in some Intel. Toboe watched all the proceedings with curious eyes. She seemed to find the human inns of particular interest, though, and had a hard time understanding that no, the hot springs were not intended for canine use. Out of sympathy, Rin didn't go either. Needless to say, Kakashi hadn't even considered a visit.

It took them another two days to reach the border of Earth Country, and when it they did it seemed almost anticlimactic. The mountains looming large and blue in the distance had been enemy territory, up until recently. They still felt like enemy territory.

Somewhere out there lay Iwagakure, a name they had learned to hate from an early age. It would feel different, after this. They would run into people who called this land home and thought of Iwa as their protectors. Not bad people, just people.

Rin was almost glad she hadn't had that insight during the war.

Just up ahead, she could see the first set of guard towers. She leaned towards Kakashi until she could feel his arm against her own. He felt warm and reassuring. He bumped her shoulder with his and smiled faintly.

"We've waited for this for two years," he said softly. "Let's finish this."

Rin smiled back as warmth surged through her. There wouldn't be much time to relax in the upcoming month, but with him by her side she knew she would be alright.

"Let's give Naruto his mom back," she said.

As the sun started to set, the mountains cast deep shadows across Earth Country.

* * *

 **Author's note:**

 **I have a Scary day tomorrow, so any and all comments would be a great joy to me!**

 **For those of you who don't know, I cross-post this story on archive of our own. Unfortunately I'm quite busy and have some health issues that make cross-posting increasingly tiresome. I've found that the AO3 user inter-face and atmosphere suits me little bit better than , so if you would like quicker updates I would recommend you go and follow me there! (hiiraeth)**

 **Further notes:**

 **my experience with two-year-olds is limited to babysitting one who, while terribly cute, wouldn't stop crying until I put her to bed. Unsurprisingly, that didn't give a very clear idea of her development level. Whatever you see here is based on what little I know of where a two-year-old should roughly be at, verbally and emotionally. I'm sorry if I got it completely wrong!**

 **In case you're unaware, 'Sukea' is literally how Japanese people pronounce 'Scare'. 'Kurou' would, similarly, the equivalent of 'Crow'. Scarecrow. Yeah. If they ever have kids, Kakashi is not allowed to name them.**


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4.**

* * *

Earth Country was stiflingly hot.

Not the kind of heat that would strike Konoha in the midst of summer, accompanied by thunderstorms and intense humidity, but the kind of dry, constant warmth that made Rin feel as though she was walking around inside one of her father's bread baking ovens.

This, combined with the increasingly mountainous terrain, made traveling hard work even at a civilian pace. She was glad she had brought knee-length leggings for underneath her shorts so that at least her shins were bare. They were unscarred so they were unlikely to draw attention, but Rin was afraid to hike up the leggings any further: about halfway up her thighs one of the seals Minato had placed to stabilize the original Sanbi seal circled around her legs and up around her pelvis, with the core being just around her navel. The second and original seal was on her abdomen, and the third ran from the center of her chest up across her collarbones and, when it was active, even around her throat.

In short, Rin's skin hadn't seen much of the sun lately. She hadn't dared to risk it.

Kakashi had brought civilian shorts. He looked particularly awkward in them, with his slightly knobby knees and the sparse few hairs that had started to grow on his calfs and shins. Together with his backpack and slightly ridiculous civilian t-shirt (it read "Bite Me" in big bold letters) he was about one pair of white socks and a Polaroid camera away from looking like an overzealous tourist.

The border guards had had quite a lot of fun with it, actually. Which was good, because so long as they laughed at them they wouldn't pay too much attention to Kakashi's slightly overlong canines or Rin's chakra presence, which even with the best of intentions could only be hidden up to a point.

The landscape around them consisted largely of reds, oranges and yellows that painted the jagged rock formations in warm and deceptively reassuring colors. There were very few trees, with low shrubbery and strange, dry looking grasses being more common. They would see strangely small, skinny wolves in the distance sometimes, which Kakashi said were called coyotes. Every now and then they would come across a creek running from the mountains, where they could refill their bottles. They ate from their supplies and from whatever they could forage on the way.

They stuck close to the roads because neither of them were familiar enough with the landscape to be able to navigate towards a town without aid. Fortunately, there were roadsigns pointing in the direction of civilian towns. Not one would never betray the presence of iwagakure, of course, but then that was hardly the point of this excursion.

No Konoha shinobi had been so free to roam Earth Country in decades.

Of course, if anyone saw through their disguise there would come a very quick and decisive end to their journey. Peace treaty or not, the war had simply been too recent for anyone to tolerate former enemies within their own borders for very long.

"We're definitely being tracked," Kakashi said that first evening, his voice barely audible over the crackle of the campfire they had just made. "Every now and then I catch a wisp of their smell."

Rin didn't outwardly respond. She knew better than to do so. "How close?" She asked.

"Close enough. Maybe five minutes, as a shinobi runs."

"That's _very_ close." Thanks for the heads-up, Sanbi.

 _Don't blame me. You're the one not giving me any leeway._

Rin snorted.

Kakashi caught on. "Turtle problems?"

"He gets a little argumentative sometimes," Rin said quietly. Kakashi's brow furrowed and his lips thinned, the same expression he always adopted when she referred to her chats with Sanbi.

"Don't worry," she added calmly. "He's behaving."

 _I am not your pet._

Rin smiled faintly. _Of course not. I'm your landlady, remember_?

Sanbi grumbled, but did not protest. Kushina's metaphor was not a very elegant one, but it worked well enough. Perhaps it was easier for Sanbi to think of himself as a tenant rather than a prisoner. Though if you asked Rin, she was as much a prisoner to him as he was to her.

Kakashi was still frowning, but he accepted her answer with a nod. "Our little hunting party isn't trying very hard to be subtle. They probably don't consider us a threat. Just worth observing."

Kakashi's senses were much stronger than those of anyone else Rin knew, and they had grown stronger still in ANBU, but he usually had to infuse them with a bit of chakra before he could sense anyone at this kind of range. He wouldn't have used chakra for fear of giving himself away, so he was sensing them without further announcing his senses. The patrol following them likely thought they were on a routine tailing mission following a couple of civilians, rather than shinobi with the means to detect them from such a distance. They would follow Kakashi and Rin for a while to see where they were headed, and then intercept them if they approached a town to check out their story. They had likely already garnered the information Rin and Kakashi had given to Kusa's border patrols.

Even so, it made Rin a little bit nervous. She stood up and stretched before walking over to Kakashi and joining him in poking at the fire. Much to her surprise, she found herself missing Toboe. She'd had to dismiss the little summon when they crossed the border out of fear that a sensor would be able to distinguish her from a normal dog. Toboe was affectionate, and right now Rin felt herself craving a good hug. She would just have to satisfy that need by sitting as close to Kakashi as she dared.

"It's strange that this country seem so peaceful," she said quietly. "I'm not sure why, but I was expecting…"

Kakashi nodded knowingly. "Me too. After Obito..." He frowned and looked down. He often did this, when he thought about Obito, but now she could see the expression on his entire face. She almost looked away from the flash of raw emotion that flashed over it.

Kakashi sighed and rubbed at his left eye, smudging the foundation on his skin.

"Don't," Rin said, catching his hand. "You'll uncover the scar."

His jaw twitched. "Right. Stupid."

"You're not used to it. It's only natural. Kurenai smudged her makeup all the time when she first started wearing it."

"I'm not sure how I feel about that comparison."

Rin smiled and released his wrist. Her hand tingled where she had touched him. "Deal with it. You wear makeup now."

His cheeks flushed a little." Not _always_ ," he said. "Only for missions – why am I defending myself? You know why I'm wearing it."

Rin laughed. "You're wearing it to present yourself in a certain manner. Just like Kurenai."

He stared at her, then sighed. "That's – yeah, okay, I guess that's true. Mahh, you're so unfair."

Rin laughed again and then, collecting her courage, leaned in to look at his face. "I don't think you smudged it too badly. Just touch it up tomorrow morning, when you wake up."

His skin still looked a little flushed, from up close. Her smile automatically widened, as it often did when they talked. She leaned out of his space before she could make him uncomfortable.

Kakashi ran a hand through his hair and avoided her eyes. "Okay. You're the expert."

Rin couldn't resist. "What, because I'm a girl?"

"Because you're – what, no, I didn't mean – you _know_ what I mean." He scowled when he caught her teasing expression. "You do the purple rectangle thing. That's makeup, right?"

"Well, they're not tattoos."

"That's Inuzuka territory, I suppose."

"Yes. Don't you have Inuzuka ancestry?"

"I guess. That's what dad used to say. Definitely on mom's side, but dad had his own weird canine thing going on," Kakashi said, staring into the fire. He didn't speak of his parents very often, and something in Rin automatically stilled.

She had seen a picture of his parents once, tucked away in an old and mostly empty family photo album she had found when she had first moved into his apartment. His father, a little bit older but still handsome, with Kakashi's coloring; and his mother, one cheek adorned with the Inuzuka red and her dark eyes sparkling with mischief. They had looked nice, if a little intimidating because of how dauntingly competent they had both been at their jobs.

Neither of them had made it past forty.

Then again, out of all the adults in Rin's life the only ones who had were her father and the Sandaime. She couldn't really count Jiraiya, who would be turning forty this year. She hadn't seen him since Minato's funeral, and thinking of him filled her with a whole host of mixed emotions. She understood why he had left. What she couldn't understand was why he hadn't taken Naruto with him, as his godfather.

She shook herself out of it. Best not to linger on some topics. "I suppose wherever your father's family came from might've had a clan similar to the Inuzuka," she suggested gently.

He paused, and then suddenly grimaced. "That sounds weirdly incestuous."

"Well, if you stop to think about it all clans are kind of –"

" _Don't._ "

Rin couldn't help but laugh at his expression. "Well, so long as you don't marry an Inuzuka, you should be just fine," she said, before she could really think about it.

Kakashi gave her a look of such astonishment that she almost laughed again. "Marry?" He repeated weakly.

"Well, as I said, that's how clans –"

"Don't you dare –"

"Keep it in the family, you know –"

At which point Kakashi threw his packet of beef jerky at her laughing face. Well, fair enough.

xXx

What followed was a lengthy and not particularly serious lecture on how Rin wasn't allowed to knock clans just because she wasn't from one herself, thank you very much, and anyway clan-less people weren't superior to clan people or vice versa, so none of this incest talk before said lecturer would throw up in his mouth, have mercy.

Needless to say they were both pretty relaxed by the time they went to sleep (one at a time, with the other standing guard) and both got a solid few hours before they packed up camp the next morning.

It proved to be a particularly hot day, and it wasn't very long before Rin found herself craving the coolness of Konoha's little river. She longed to take her boots off and take a dive, and knew Sanbi agreed.

Instead, they had another fairly long trek to go, after which they found themselves in a small farmer's settlement where they could ask for directions. Kakashi had one town in particular in mind, as it could count a sizable casino amongst its many fine establishments.

Well. They knew what sort of a woman they were chasing, didn't they?

They got their directions from a hapless old lady who wouldn't stop squeezing Kakashi's cheeks (Rin wisely stayed out of reach) and scolded him for the text on his shirt ("don't you know how rude that is, young man? You ought to know better!"). After they finally made their escape, Kakashi's right cheek looked rather ruddy and painful.

Rin's lips quirked into a smile.

"Not a word," Kakashi hissed, holding up one finger.

Of course, that didn't really help with the laughter.

xXx

The sense of peace they both felt couldn't last, of course. Peace was generally the sort of thing other people felt, and Kakashi and Rin could only observe from a distance. That they had managed to spend two days in Earth Country without any trouble had been something of a miracle in itself, but it still came as a surprise to Rin when things finally did come to a head.

The journey to the casino town would take another day, so they stopped to make camp late in the afternoon at the foot of a mountain. When they explored the area they came across a creek which grew wider and wider as they followed it upstream, and culminated in a rather beautiful, secluded pool that was fed by a small waterfall.

In different company, Rin might have danced with excitement. As it was, her gaze crossed Kakashi's and he smiled, rolled his eyes and nodded at the pool. "Go on, then. I'll set up camp. Don't stay too long," he said.

Rin beamed. If either of them were hugging people, this would be when she crushed the air from his ribs. Her body felt sticky with sweat and dust, and to be able to wash it off would be heavenly.

Kakashi gave her a little ways and sauntered off, hands in his pockets. She watched him go, and then dropped her backpack to the ground to prepare. She took off her boots first, and dipped her feet into the pool. The first few feet weren't too deep, but the water still felt deliciously cool on her overheated skin. She stood there for a few minutes, simply basking in the sensation of it, before she grabbed the hands of her shirt and began to pull it up.

"The water is a little cold to go swimming," a voice rang out.

Rin's foot slipped on the slick stone and slid hip deep into the water before she could catch herself. Her chakra flared up instinctively and the water directly around her started to bubble and steam. Rin gritted her teeth and pushed her chakra back into the pit of her stomach before it would lash out against her will.

The stranger chuckled, swinging his legs out over the waterfall from where he perched on a jutting rock just above it. "Yes, that's what I suspected. Sorry for startling you, but I thought I'd better not wait any longer. I wouldn't be here at all, except, well. You're a shinobi, judging by that little display. Where are you from?"

Rin stared at him. She had to crane her neck to see him properly, as his perch was at least ten foot up. He was from Iwa, judging by his headband and his loose red robes. His haggard face placed him somewhere in his late thirties, although his thick red beard made it hard to see. There was no malice in his eyes, but something about him seemed distinctly off.

Whoever he was, he wore his aura of power like a cloak.

Rin didn't move. If he wanted a fight, the water was her natural habitat. There would be no better place from which to wage her war. "Waterfall," she lied, "but I left."

The man tilted his head. "You're a bit young to be a rogue."

"Is there such a thing as being too young, to a shinobi?" Rin retorted.

His eyebrows lifted and his smile widened. It had the effect of making him look older rather than younger, which Rin couldn't help but be assured by. She had to stay on guard, obviously, but he seemed...

Familiar, somehow. The thought made her wary. Some shinobi would cultivate an image of kindness. Made it much easier to stab others in the back.

"Are you looking for Iwagakure, then?" The man asked. "Because they don't usually go for foreign recruits."

"I'm not. Are you going to give me a choice?"

The man's smile faded slowly and a more thoughtful expression appeared on his face. "I ought to bring you in, but frankly, I don't really feel the need," he said. "I suppose I didn't leave on the best of terms, this morning."

Rin blinked. "Are you a rogue, too?"

His lips quirked. "In a way, I suppose."

That wasn't very helpful. Was he, or wasn't he? She wished she had Kakashi's knack for annoying people into answering him. "If you are," she said carefully, "then we don't have a problem, do we?"

The man humm I ed under his breath, and slowly shifted his weight before dropping down to the foot of the waterfall. He landed on the water's surface with barely a splash. Up close, his chakra burned like a furnace. Rin's heartbeat sped up.

 _Oh, what's this? Have you got a challenger for me_? Sanbi grumbled, waking up. Rin ignored him.

The stranger was shorter than she had expected, but with chakra like that he had to be a jounin at the very least. She knew how devastatingly fast Kakashi could be – if this man was the same, she might not be able to counter.

The stranger frowned a little as he looked her over. "You don't look much like a Waterfall girl to me," he mused. "They tend to have darker complexions, don't they..? Hmm."

Rin held her breath.

"Well, I suppose that's just a stereotype," the stranger said, smiling. There was a sardonic edge to his voice. He knew it was a lie. He had to know. "My name is Roshi. Have you heard that name before?" He added, still with that falsely cheery tone.

"I haven't," Rin said. There was a tremor in her voice and she instinctively stepped back, further up on to the bank.

 _Come now, little Rin. Give me just a few minutes of freedom, and I'll stop him from scaring you,_ Sanbi crooned. _This guy seems strong_. _I would have_ fun.

Roshi looked her over again with a scrutinizing eye, as if to see whether she was lying. Something strange and dark flashed across Roshi's face as he looked down at her legs, and he suddenly took a step back, his smile completely fading. "Perhaps you really haven't," he said, sounding more genuine than before, "but I think perhaps you should."

His chakra flashed suddenly, the feeling of it bursting out of his body like flames, even though no jutsu was activated.

The moment he did, Sanbi roared out in fury. _IT'S HIM_! He cried out, throwing himself against his chains with enough force that Rin could feel it like a physical blow. It _'s him, it's him_!

Rin staggered back and forced her chakra back up against Sanbi's to contain him, or soothe him, whichever came first. As she retreated she realized her mistake: she had rolled up her leggings and, in doing so, exposed the lower edges of her seal where it circled around her upper thighs. When she had stepped back onto the bank, into the shallows...

He must have recognized her seals.

Roshi knew what she was. And Sanbi knew what _Roshi_ was.

"You're a –" she gasped.

"Yes," he said, now staring at her eyes. "I am. And so, it seems, are you. Sanbi, is it? That's what my... passenger says. Which means you're Kiri, not Waterfall."

Rin didn't correct him. She felt dizzy just from holding Sanbi back, and the edges of her vision seemed to blur the way they often did when Sanbi had taken enough of her over to turn her eyes into an alarming shade of magenta. No wonder Roshi was staring.

"Which – which one are you?" She asked.

Iwa had two jinchuuriki, after all.

Roshi grimaced briefly. "Yonbi. One up from you."

 _I'll SHOW you who's one up from who!_ Sanbi roared, bashing against Rin's shields again. She staggered, gasped, but she kept her footing. The water around her was starting to heat up from the force of his rage. If he would start boiling it, she would have to get out.

Roshi didn't relax. "It's still pretty new to you, I take it? He's giving you a hard time?"

" _Yes_ ," Rin gasped. It was hard even just to breathe. She fumbled around in her hip bag. She still had one of Minato's seals, if she could just get it out...

"I remember those days. Don't give up, though. You won't like what happens if you do," he said.

She already knew what would happen if she lost control. She had seen it ravage her village.

"Why... Do they hate each other?" Rin gasped.

"Hell if I know."

 _It's not my brother I hate_ , Sanbi hissed. _It's this wretched cage_! _LET ME OUT_.

Rin shook her head fiercely and forced herself to back up onto the bank until she was no longer in the water. If she could be around Naruto and Kushina without it being a problem, she could do this, too. "They seriously need to work on their anger management," she growled out through gritted teeth.

This earned her a strained smile. "I don't think self-actualization is very high on their agenda," Roshi said. "Certainly explains why you left Kiri, though. I can't imagine the village of the bloody mist would be any kinder on their jinchuuriki than they are on the rest of their people."

Rin tipped her head in acknowledgment. Kiri certainly hadn't been kind to her. The tips of her fingers touched the flimsy paper of Minato's seal. She pulled it out and immediately stuck it to decide of her thigh.

The relief was almost instantaneous. The build-up of Sanbi's chakra collapsed and flushed out of her system, leaving Rin shaking with adrenaline. Her own chakra heaved in protest, and she felt the overwhelming urge to just let it burn out of her in one of her favorite water jutsu, just to get rid of that awful feeling of overflowing with power. She pushed it down ruthlessly. Roshi wasn't being aggressive, and he obviously had some issues with Iwa. If she did start a fight with him, it could be potentially catastrophic. Kakashi was too close for that to happen.

Roshi made an approving noise. "That's a start," he said. "Next, get the hell out of here. Stay away from Iwa, if you don't want to end up getting a vivisection. Stay alive. And run, keep running, as far away from your home as you can. _They are not worth your suffering_." He practically growled the last few words.

Rin's confusion must have shown. Roshi snorted. "Given how far you've already made it, I guess you already knew that. Just don't think they're going to treat you any better anywhere else. Our lot is a rotten one, kid."

"Is that why you left this morning? Are they cruel to you?"

Roshi twitched. Something in his face changed, and Rin knew that she wouldn't get an answer.

"Don't ask stupid questions, girl."

Just behind her, Kakashi's chakra came roaring into existence, like a haze of fury pouring out from the center of his body as he came racing to her side. The sword in his hand was the one she had given him two years ago, for his birthday, and it glowed nearly white with his rage.

"I sensed _Sanbi_ , are you – "he hissed, glancing briefly at her before focusing the heat of his glare on Roshi once more.

Roshi's shoulders sagged. "Ah. Your handler, I presume," he said, sounding tired. "Perhaps you're not a runaway, after all."

Rin's heart raced. "No, no – you don't understand," she stepped between the two, holding up her hands. "Roshi-san, this is my – my brother. Sukea, it's okay, Roshi-san is like me."

Kakashi froze. "You mean..?"

"Yes. But he's not going to take me to Iwa. Are you, Roshi-san?" Rin said, turning back to Roshi.

Roshi's lip curled up in disdain. "A jinchuuriki, and a teenager with enough killing intent to lay out an ox," he said. "Should we be expecting a hunting party too, then? I can't imagine Kiri takes very kindly to two such assets running away." Doubt practically dripped off his voice as he said it.

"Please, Roshi-san, I promise you we're not –"

"for a pair of siblings, the two of you look awfully dissimilar," Roshi sneered. "Sure, there's the hair color, but that's about the only resemblance. And, really, if you've got teeth that look like they could rip out throats you probably shouldn't be bearing them when you come charging in pretending to be a civilian," he added, practically snapping at Kakashi.

Kakashi's lips curled down in displeasure, simultaneously hiding his pronounced canines again. "Perhaps you shouldn't throw your chakra around like that if you don't want to draw unwanted attention," he said coolly.

Roshi snorted. "People who sense my chakra don't usually come charging in to fight me."

"I guess you underestimated your audience."

" _Sukea_ ," Rin ground out, forcing herself to use his fake name. "Don't. Roshi-san wasn't going to hurt me."

"How can you be so sure about that?"

Roshi gave a scoffing laugh. "Little boy comes charging in and immediately thinks he knows what's going on better than we do, does he? Typical shinobi!"

" Roshi-san! Please." She looked from one to the other, as sternly as she could manage. "There is no need for any of us to fight."

Something in her tone finally seemed to land for Kakashi, who clenched his jaw but slid into a slightly more relaxed pose. His chakra, still angry, started to feel less like a wildfire and more like a flame.

Roshi watched him intently for a moment, and then relaxed himself. "I know you're lying to me," he said slowly, "but I will tolerate the two of you for the sake of your burden." His eyes flicked over to Rin to leave no doubt as to which burden he meant. "You're lucky I parted on bad terms with my own village this morning, or I would have done my damn best to incinerate the two of you."

Kakashi bristled, but Rin silenced them both with a look. "That would not have gone well for either of us, Roshi-san. I am young, but I'm not a pushover. I'm sure you can imagine. Nor is my friend."

Roshi twitched slightly. "Tell me this, at least. Why are you here? Why on earth did you think here would be safer?"

Rin hesitated. How much could she safely tell him? She felt a strange kind of kinship with him, due to their shared burden, but she would be a fool to trust him outright. She wished for a moment that they had met under different circumstances. With Kushina in a coma, there was no one else for her to talk to about being a jinchuuriki. No one else who could really understand, anyway. And even if Kushina did wake up, she would no longer truly be a jinchuuriki, her burden largely transferred to her son. It would be different.

"There someone else. Like you and me," she said slowly. "We're trying to help her."

"Another jinchuuriki?" Roshi frowned.

"We need to find someone else to do it. Our business won't interfere with yours, or Iwa's," Rin continued, ignoring his question. If he couldn't infer it from what she had said, that was his problem. She wasn't about to explain their entire situation to him.

Roshi's dark eyes stared intently into hers, as if he thought he could see straight into her soul. "People like us aren't treated well, in this country," he said slowly. "My… Fellow Iwa jinchuuriki and I... Were both made into hosts when we were barely more than toddlers. Since then, they've treated us like pariahs. Necessary evil. First they beat a dog, and then they are surprised when it bites back. It is no different in the other villages. There is no safe space for us. But..." He trailed off and went silent, lost in thought for a moment. "But if anyone can understand what that is like, it's other jinchuuriki. So perhaps we ought to support each other."

Relief blossomed through Rin's chest like wildfire. "Yes, _yes_."

Roshi grimaced. "So, do what you have to do. Save this woman. God knows no one else will. And when you're done, you get the hell out of here, you hear me?"

"I understand," Rin said.

Roshi nodded and took a step back, his eyes flicking between the two of them. "Don't stick around here for too long. Our little power display will have alerted your tail. Move quickly. Move quietly. Go now."

He looked at them for a little bit longer, eyes lingering on Rin's face and Kakashi's eye patch, and then abruptly turned around and vanished between the rocks.

Rin almost fell to her knees with relief.

A hand landed on her shoulder. Kakashi. "Rin? Did he hurt you?" He asked her quietly.

Rin shook her head. "I'm... I'm fine. More shaken than anything else."

Kakashi knelt next to her to look her in the eyes. "They're turning back to their normal color," he said, sounding relieved. "Was he really a jinchuuriki?"

"Yes. I could feel it."

They are not worth your suffering, he had said. He had sounded so bitter, so sad. If he really believed she was from Kiri, he probably believed she was on the run.

He... He had tried to _help_ her, even before she had told him she wanted to help another jinchuuriki's.

He had tried to help her, a complete stranger, because she was a jinchuuriki like him.

It made her feel strangely sad that he had left so quickly.

"-re not listening to me. Rin, hey," Kakashi waved his hand before her eyes, before pulling her up by her arm. "Come on, we have to go. He was right, the patrol is going to be here, soon. Come on, get dressed." His hand hovered awkwardly around the edge of her leggings, as if he thought she was so out of it that he had to pull them down for her.

Rin's eyes burned with some strange and overpowering emotion, but she shook herself out of her thoughts and pulled the legs of her legging back down. She found her boots a few steps away and put those on, too. She might get blisters because of her still wet skin, but so be it. She didn't feel much like sticking around and discovering how truthful this other jinchuuriki had really been.

For some reason, the thought of Roshi betraying her burned.

Kakashi half dragged her along for the first mile or so, while her legs were still gaining strength, but it wasn't long before her body found its usual equilibrium. Somewhere behind them, Roshi was trying to find his own way out. But he was alone, with no Kakashi by his side to help him. He was alone, because that was the fate of most jinchuuriki.

Not for the first time, Rin found herself fiercely grateful for her own little family, and terrified of what her other friends might say if they knew what she really was.

* * *

 **AN:**

 **Hope you enjoyed it! Please do let me know, I've had another rough week and comments always cheer me up. I probably won't be able to finish chapter 5 before the end of the year, so happy holidays to all of you!**

 **Again, for quicker updates follow me on AO3 hiiraeth. I will probably be moving there permanently for future stories!**

 **Notes:**

 **I pictured Earth Country as a kind of wild West landscape, with little vegetation and lots of huge orange rock formations. I don't really remember how it was portrayed in Canon, but this is my interpretation. Roshi is, of course, canon's 4-tails jinchuuriki.**


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5.**

* * *

The patrol caught up with them in about ten minutes, fading out of the shadows that crossed the dusty red land. There was no running away from them in these unfamiliar lands without giving away their shinobi status and getting hopelessly lost.

The only thing for it was for Kakashi and Rin to allow themselves to be surrounded, and face the music. Whether they liked it or not.

The patrol counted five shinobi, all clad in the dusky red and brown of Iwa. Their leader was a plain-faced man with keen, suspicious eyes. "Name and country of origin?" He barked, inspecting them with the same expression Kakashi usually reserved for snotty genin.

When it came to pretending to be someone she was not, Rin had some experience.

"Nobe Rei and Sukea, from Grass Country," Rin said, praying the stammer in her voice was convincing. "We – we are going to see our aunt? Her name is –"

"Yes, thank you. Her name is irrelevant. Where in Grass Country?"

Rin named a small hamlet near the border of the land of Earth they had decided on earlier. She kept her head down and bit her lip, inching closer to Kakashi as if she was looking for some security. He, meanwhile, was playing the role of the protective older brother, putting an arm around her shoulders. It looked pretty convincing, but Rin could feel how little weight he was actually resting on her shoulders. She fought the urge to smile. Playing a normal teenage kid who had no issues with touching people? It had to be killing him.

The shinobi leader looked down at his paperwork, leaving through the pages before nodding and handing the paper off to one of his teammates. "We sensed a disturbance about fifteen minutes ago, near your location. Care to tell us what happened?"

Kakashi and Rin exchanged a look. Rin couldn't read him. The arm around her shoulders disappeared.

"There was this man," Kakashi said, taking a step forward. His expression was suitably spooked. "He watched us. I don't know what he wanted, but… He was strange."

For a moment, Rin wondered why on earth he would stick so close to the truth, but she realized the answer just as quickly. Roshi likely had quite the reputation of the home, if he was treated as badly as he had implied. By putting a face to their assailant, Kakashi was giving more credence to their story.

"Terrifying," Rin agreed, although she hated the thought of Roshi being tracked down because of this information. "I almost fainted."

Which was a weak excuse. Any real civilian _would_ have fainted under the chakra pressure Roshi put out. She could only hope these guys didn't know that.

The other shinobi exchanged looks. "This man. What did he look like?"

"Oh, it was hard to focus," Rin said, just as Kakashi said, "I think he had a beard. Red hair."

Something in the leader's face twitched. One of the shinobi at the back took a tentative step forward. "That does match our reports, Captain," he said.

The leader shot him an annoyed glance. "Hush, Yashida." He turned back on Kakashi and Rin. "Did this man say anything?"

"I don't know. He seemed unhinged," Kakashi said, and Rin's stomach dropped. He was pandering to a stereotype, she knew that, he would never actually believe it – right?

Right?

Kakashi glanced at her, clearly expecting her to speak up, but Rin couldn't say anything. She felt nauseous.

"Unhinged, huh? Yeah, that sounds about right," the shinobi leader finally said, relaxing a little. His men laughed. "Don't take it personally. He's got a lot on his mind," the latter he said with a grin and a wink at his teammates, who laughed harder.

None of this was really helping with Rin's nausea.

"If that's all, shinobi-san..." Kakashi began.

The team leader dropped his smile. "Just a moment. In what direction did this man move?"

"Uhh – I don't know. East, maybe? It was hard to think straight," Kakashi said.

"Right, right. Well, kids – truth be told, you're lucky to be alive. He's not a nice man," the leader said. "Although he doesn't usually bother civilians…" He frowned.

"Thank you for checking up on us," Rin forced out, giving the team a hurried bow. "I am glad the shinobi of Iwagakure take such good care of their people. She really, really wanted them to leave.

 _I could make them_ , Sanbi whispered.

Kakashi belatedly bowed as well, and the frown fell off the team leader's face. He even managed a smile. "Sure, kids. Now, on your way –"

The sentence was cut off when his only female teammate suddenly stepped forward and grabbed his elbow. Rin hadn't noticed her up until then; with her height and androgynous face, Rin had confused her for one of the men. The woman looked almost sickly pale, and was looking straight at Rin.

"Captain," the woman said. "Captain, I'm sensing something off about the girl –"

A sensor. The woman was a chakra sensor. _Exactly_ what the other team would need to see through their disguise.

"I think she's," the woman managed to say, and then her eyes suddenly rolled into the back of her head and she dropped to the ground.

For a moment, all the Iwa chunin could do was stare. Then they turned as one to Kakashi and Rin –

And stared straight into a fully developed Sharingan.

Rin hadn't seen Kakashi fight in over a year, and now she realized just how his practice with Mikoto showed. He ducked and weaved between their opponents, like water shifting through rocks. The Sharingan glowed ominously as each and every last one of his enemies' blows went wide. He moved like a ghost, Rin thought. Like he wasn't there at all, just some after-image of him. He was hardly even panting by the time he'd dropped the first three. This was the power of the Sharingan, combined with his particular brand of lethal grace and brilliance.

Rin wondered if even Obito could have predicted something like this.

The last of the chunin came rushing at Rin at high speed, leaving her only a moment to think "no visible marks" before she ducked smoothly underneath the chunin's adrenaline fueled swing and called up a sheet of water to cover his face and choke him into unconsciousness. It only took a moment, and then silence returned to the clearing.

"Not exactly what we planned," she breathed. "Are you sure that was wise?"

Kakashi looked at her with the strangest kind of smile. It was only there for a moment before it vanished, but it lingered long enough that Rin wouldn't be able to forget it anytime soon.

Kakashi shook himself out of whatever he had been thinking and started to drag the nearest body behind the nearest rock large enough to, well, hide a couple of bodies. "They would have attacked in a moment, anyway. Did you kill him?"

"No. That seemed a bit disproportional," Rin said truthfully.

Kakashi nodded. "Good. Well, it makes it more difficult for us, but they're just chunin, not monsters."

Pride welled up inside her, briefly pushing past the hurt caused by his earlier remark about Roshi. He had come a long way. Perhaps it was strange to be considerate to people who had been her enemies very recently, but up close they looks no different than a Konoha patrol. She bent down to help Kakashi with the bodies. "They're going to be trouble when they wake up, though. Any ideas?"

Kakashi hummed under his breath. "Genjutsu. There's one I know from ANBU – copied it, but haven't really had the time to perfect it yet. If I get it right, it should convince them they're tied up with. After a day or two they'll realize they've been had, but at least they won't starve to death. Assuming that's what we're aiming for."

"We are. Like you said, there's no reason to kill them. And we don't want to start another war." As pride faded her earlier irritation resurfaced, coloring her words. She paused and pushed it down. "Let's put them in the shade. Dehydration is a real risk for them otherwise. And we need to think of a solution for what we do when they do wake up and warn others."

"New disguises and new names, if we can manage them," Kakashi said. "And quickly, too. Someone is bound to notice these guys have vanished. To be honest, if this were an ANBU mission, this would be the point where we would give up because the risk of incriminating ourselves was too big." He finished dragging another of the shinobi behind the rock and sighed. "Beard guy really threw us for a loop here."

Rin stilled. Well, if he was going to press the issue… "He wasn't deranged, though," she said. She looked away.

"What?"

"You said he was deranged. He wasn't."

Kakashi finally looked up from what he was doing with a quizzical frown, as if he had only just noticed her anger. "I know. I just figured –"

"That they would assume he is deranged because he's a jinchuuriki," Rin finished for him. She had to say it. She couldn't just stew on her anger and thus give Sanbi more of a foothold. But truth be told, she wanted to say it. She wanted to let him know his tricky words had hurt her, even if it had been unintentionally.

She had to make him understand, even if only a little, what it did to her when she was reminded that people actually thought that way about people like her.

"I'm… Sorry," he said after a moment, still frowning. "But you know I didn't mean you."

"No, you didn't. Nobody does. Because they don't really know who jinchuuriki really are. They can't see past that label and understand the person behind it."

"I see you," Kakashi said. "I see you, and Kushina, and Naruto. I'm sorry if I made you doubt that, even for a moment."

The sincerity in his voice finally made some of that anger loosen and dissipate. What was left wasn't aimed at him but at people like the Iwa team leader, who could look at a man in crisis, call him deranged, and laugh. It was aimed at her friends, when she thought that they might drop her if they knew the truth. And it was aimed at shinobi in general, for forcing there to be jinchuuriki in the first place.

She took a deep, controlled breath. She slowly let it out. "I know you do," she finally said. "But I can't stand it when you say such things, even when you don't mean them."

"I know," Kakashi said, sounding pained. "You trust me."

For a moment, Rin was sure that he knew exactly where he stood with her, and how much she needed him to be on her side. It was simultaneously terrifying and comforting. "You know I do."

He gave her a crooked little smile that didn't quite reach his eyes, although it didn't lack for warmth. "Care to hide some bodies with your best friend?" He quipped.

Rin stared at him for a moment. Then, a laugh escaped her. Perhaps it was the absurdity of their situation or the relief of his confirmation of trust, but it felt good to laugh.

Kakashi smile widened a little. It didn't stop him from pointing at the body of the man she had taken down and saying, "chop chop, he won't move himself."

Which didn't really help with the laughing.

* * *

They moved as quickly as they dared for the next two hours or so, avoiding the larger roads as much as they could.

Fortunately, as their destination was very much a town dominated by civilians and still relatively close to the border, there were far fewer shinobi around. That was undoubtedly also one of Tsunade's reasons for picking this particular town, aside from the obvious attractions.

As the town appeared on the horizon, Kakashi wondered idly if it would be anything like Steam village, with its scantily-clad people.

He didn't particularly care for the fact that the sentence ended there, in his mind. He tried to conjure up some kind of interest for the gambling dens or alcohol that had also been present, but his brain didn't take the bait. It stuck on scantily-clad people and insisted on showcasing a few of his clearer memories.

This was A Problem.

He tried to think of Rin and his present situation instead, but this only had the unfortunate side effect of blurring the present and past together in a way his brain _certainly_ hadn't before. Rin, taking out that chunin in one smooth movement – while wearing significantly fewer clothes.

Yeah, no, _definitely_ a problem. His brain didn't much discriminate between men and women when it came to these kinds of thoughts, but it had always done him the courtesy of not involving his best friend/teammate/roommate when it conjured up scenarios. He had _liked_ it that way. It was nice and uncomplicated, much unlike having such thoughts about someone you saw on a daily basis. That made only having a single wall between their bedrooms _significantly_ more uncomfortable.

"Are you feeling okay? You look a little flushed," Rin said, coming up from behind him to put a hand to his forehead. He almost slapped it away.

"Just fine!" He said. His voice squeaked a little.

Best friend, she's your best friend, he told himself. She ought to be clothed on all occasions, even in your brain. Stick to the people from Steam village. Much safer that way.

Stick was kind of funny word, wasn't it, if you thought about it in a certain way –

Kakashi bit his tongue hard enough to taste blood. Rin was still looking at him funny. Of course she was. He prayed to whatever God there was that she hadn't magically learned to read minds or – or that she could otherwise, err, discover what was going through his mind. It would probably be a very confusing thing to see from the outside, anyway. Lots of gyrating.

He almost slapped himself. "Common protocol dictates there's going to be one or two guards at the gate, for a town this size," he rattled off. Yes, finally a safe topic! "Not necessarily shinobi though; they probably can't spare the men, this shortly after the war."

"That's good." A beat. "Are you _sure_ you're okay?"

"Absolutely!"

"… Okay. So long as you remember our new cover story."

"I don't forget mission details."

"... Of course, you never would." Rin smiled hesitantly. "Well, let's hope for the best!" She said, crossing her fingers.

The possibility of discovery did, at least, cool down Kakashi's rather bothersome brain a little. Scantily clad people were replaced by scowling enemies and the two women he remembered meeting two years ago. Tsunade always looked sad in his memory. Would Shizune still be with her? She would be eighteen now, wouldn't she? Or thereabouts? She might have set out to live a life of her own…

Somehow, he couldn't picture it. Her loyalty to Tsunade had seemed unconditional. Barring any tragedies, she would still be there. Good. Two people were easier to find than one. Of course, it would be easier still if he could use his dogs, but he wanted to check the town for shinobi before risking it.

"Speaking of mission details," Rin continued quietly, "this town..?"

"Ishitani-cho. Midsized town, locally governed. Famous for its casino, but also for its black-market and civilian-run gangs," Kakashi rattled off. "We had an agent stationed here up until a few months ago to keep track of potential trade links to Fire Country."

"Sounds... Lovely," Rin grimaced. "Although – if it is self-governing, that would explain the gangs. If Iwa was in charge those would be long gone."

"Which in turn explains why _she_ would come here."

"I suppose even someone of her caliber would prefer to avoid being found out."

Kakashi sniffed. "If she would fight at all. "

"Didn't she fight in Steam?"

"She charged in to protect her student, and then she left. Looked like she couldn't stand the sight of the fight. She certainly didn't stick around to help us," he replied. "We didn't end up losing any people, but if we had? That would have been on her."

Rin frowned at him. "It's not that I don't understand why you're angry, but if we're going to convince her to come home with us you're going to have to keep it to yourself," she said gently.

Kakashi fought down the irrational burst of anger her words caused. She was right, of course, and he was no longer at twelve-year-old brat. He wouldn't allow himself to be that person again. He looked away, out across the road that ran towards the town. He saw a few carts in the distance, each filled with goods and the merchants who pendled them.

"I know," he finally said. "I won't compromise it."

Rin smiled and bumped her shoulder against his. He couldn't tell what she was thinking behind that smile, but it was still somehow reassuring. He managed a smile of his own. She liked it when he smiled back.

The towers of Ishitani-chou loomed over them like huge beehives, apartments stacked one atop another.

"Look at all the colors!" Rin gasped, pointing out the painted shutters and different plaster works. Many of them were in earth tones, but a few had been painted bright yellows and oranges with wall high portraits in impossible colors curling around the windows. The side of another tall building was taken up completely by a painting of a woman dancing to an imagined beat.

Rin took it all in with wide-eyed wonder. Kakashi felt more wary himself, far too aware of their mission. On the upside, at least they hadn't entered the town through its red light district. He shivered. His earlier train derailment had been quite enough of that one day, thanks.

They followed the plan and walked through the town until they reached a quieter neighborhood with a small hotel they could use as their base of operations. Once they were in their room they changed their clothes, eye contacts and, in Rin's case, haircut.

Kakashi, for his part, looked at the unruly mob of brown curls he had given himself and grabbed his kunai, ready to start cutting the hair off.

Rin brought her hands to her face when he got out of the bathroom, her eyes as wide as saucers. "You cut off your hair," she squeaked out.

Kakashi shrugged. His head felt strangely cold with hair this short. "I figure the patrol would remember the curls," he said, feeling strangely self-conscious. Perhaps cutting it this short had been a bit silly, after all…

"You could have just... Washed out the dye," Rin said, now hiding behind her hands.

"Is it… That bad?"

"It's – well! It's. It's something."

"So it's not great."

"It's a little… Uneven."

"I didn't have scissors."

Which was the point where Rin started laughing. Kakashi flushed red. She hadn't been shocked, she'd been trying not to laugh! His mouth went thin. "Well – at least they won't recognize me," he protested halfheartedly.

Rin made a strange wheezing sound. She'd gone red in the face, and was now waving her hand while being as if to cool it. "I'm sorry – I – oh gosh – I shouldn't laugh at you, it's just that you forgot to do the back, so now you've got – you've got –"

Great. He had a mullet now. He hated mullets.

Growling, he stomped back to the bathroom and went to work on the rest of his rebellious hair. When he was done, he touched his reflection in the mirror. He could barely even recognize himself. He saw himself in the mirror often enough, but never with the scar covered up or his hair dyed brown and close cropped. It did strange things to the planes of his face. He briefly wondered whether Rin would like it.

No, nope, not going there. It was just a face, one that was hiding a particularly stupid brain. Puberty, as far as Kakashi was concerned, could go and stick it where the sun didn't shine. That would be a far more productive use of its time.

Objectively, he looked fine. His team captain in ANBU would approve. The only real issue was the eyepatch, but going without it would be worse. He couldn't keep the eye open for long enough, not even if he covered it with a dark contact lens. He sighed and tied it back on before leaving the bathroom again.

"There. Are you happy now?" He asked Rin, turning on the spot and making sure to point at the back of his head. "No mullet."

Except that Rin didn't look at him. She was staring out of the window, wide-eyed. "Kakashi... This Shizune person... You said she has a pet pig, didn't you? And black hair?"

"I… Did."

Rin nodded slowly. "Then this is our lucky day, because I just saw her walk past the hotel."

* * *

 **AN.**

 **Calling it now: Kakashi has a competence kink. Also, I know people tend to write him as being either completely gay or completely straight, but I present to you the best of both worlds: bisexual Kakashi. I feel powerful.**

 **Next time, the kids encounter Shizune and Tsunade – but their luck might just run out. It can't be too easy, can it?**

 **In other news, did you know only about 8% of you guys comment? I'd love to get those numbers up!**


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6.**

* * *

 **Little head's up: at one point, Rin's train of thought implies that she doesn't blame her father but herself for his rejecting her. This is, of course, entirely incorrect. Parental neglect/abuse is a terribly insidious thing indeed.**

* * *

Shizune navigated the streets of Ishitani-cho with the ease of a native, slipping through crowds without drawing notice for even a moment and disappearing into alleyways before reappearing in a completely different place. Her chakra was coiled tightly within her, barely perceptible, and her smell was so hard to distinguish she may as well not have had one.

In short, she moved like a shinobi in hiding.

"She moves well. I guess she really has been with Senju Tsunade-hime for almost ten years," Rin muttered, as she and Kakashi paced after Toboe, whose short little legs moved quickly enough to blur as she tracked Shizune, her nose pressed firmly to the ground.

"If _Tsunade-hime_ ever gets around to teaching," Kakashi muttered back.

They exited the alley and had to wait for a large cart to pass before continuing. The streets were so crowded that the influx of smells and chakra signatures had been a little overwhelming to Toboe, but she'd powered through it like a trooper. She was making real progress.

"Please keep that to yourself, would you?" Rin said, her eyes flicking across the crowds. "I doubt she'll go anywhere if we insult her first."

"It might be a bit too late for that," Kakashi admitted.

Rin's stomach lurched. "Oh no, _Kakashi_."

"To be fair, I was fourteen."

"That's no excuse! I know you were a little… Difficult, but –"

Toboe made an abrupt right turn, briefly disappearing from sight. They had to run to catch up.

"– But I figured you would respect her, for being a legendary shinobi," Rin finished, frowning.

"Mahh, sure, but she was drunk and rude, so I figured –"

" _Drunk_?"

"Ahh. Did I neglect to tell you our only hope for Kushina's survival is a raging drunkard?"

Rin stopped walking for long enough to square her jaw and glare at him. Satisfyingly, he flinched a little.

"You told me," she finally said. "But that kind of language isn't going to convince her to come along."

"We both know this entire thing is a long-shot. Even if she didn't drink, the only reason she hasn't been labeled a missing Nin is because she's on friendly terms with the Hokage," he countered.

"We still have to try."

"I know, and we will – but that doesn't mean we have to mollycoddle her. She needs to take responsibility."

Up ahead, Toboe barked. Her high-pitched voice was already growing familiar enough that Rin could pick it out in a crowd, even with several other dogs roaming the street. The little dog had stopped in front of an apartment block, waiting for them to arrive with a wagging tail. "In here," she said.

Kakashi and Rin exchanged a look, then entered the foyer. Toboe's nails clipped loudly on the linoleum floors as she led them on. They went two floors up and then maneuvered through a hallway past a few rope skipping children. Toboe stopped before the last door in the hallway, her tongue lolling from her mouth. She grinned. "Looksie."

The door was closed, but Rin trusted the dog's judgment. Kakashi pushed Rin back into the hallway to wait just around the corner, out of sight of the children and anyone else who might leave the apartment. Kakashi unceremoniously scooped Toboe up and clamped her snout shut. He gave her a strict look and held up his index finger. Toboe whined but nodded, and Kakashi put her back on the floor.

After some ten minutes, Toboe pressed her wet nose against the back of Rin's leg. At the same time, a door opened and closed in the distance. Rin grabbed Kakashi's elbow. Shizune was leaving. Unless she jumped out of the window she would have to come past the two of them..

Kakashi pulled her into the stairwell and forcefully sat the both of them down on the top step, their backs towards the hallway. They would just look like a pair of teenagers hanging out. Toboe plopped herself down on Rin's lap. Rin ran her hand through the dog's fur without even feeling it. All she could focus on were the footsteps behind her.

Then, the brush of fabric against a doorpost and sandals on the concrete stairs. A whiff of disinfectant, and then a slight figure clad in black brushed past them, muttering a soft apology. Kakashi's fingers tightened around Rin's, and he stood up.

"Shizune," he began.

Shizune flinched visibly and whirled around to face them. She was perhaps a year or two older than Rin, with a slightly plain but not un-pretty face with large black eyes and a black bob. She was skinny, but taller than Rin. A senbon glistened in her raised fist. "Whoever you are," she said, "I warn you – I'm armed."

Her voice was perfectly controlled and her hand didn't so much as tremble. If she had wanted to loosen that senbon, they would have been hard-pressed to dodge it.

"Shizune-san," Rin began, carefully putting Toboe down, "we're not here to fight."

Shizune's eyes narrowed. "How do you know my name?"

"Mahh, I guess I'm a little unrecognizable like this," Kakashi drawled.

Shizune shot him an annoyed look, then did a double take. Her eyes flicked from his hair to his eye to his chin, then narrowed again. "I don't know who –" she blinked. Her chakra reached out tentatively, raising the hairs on Rin's arms. Kakashi allowed his own to briefly rise to the surface so she could recognize it.

"Wait, don't tell me. You're that boy from –" Shizune cut herself off again.

Shizune's eyes dropped to his face again. Her eyebrows rose slightly.

Kakashi flushed red and pulled at his scarf as if he wanted to cover his face up. Shizune saw, and raised her eyebrows even further.

"Nice… Haircut," Shizune said awkwardly. She grimaced.

Rin came to the rescue. "I'm sorry, but is there anywhere we can talk?" She asked, keeping her voice down.

Shizune's eyes briefly flicked over Rin's form as if to check her for weapons. Then she nodded. "You're with him?" She asked.

"We're teammates," Rin said.

Shizune's mouth opened in an oh shape. "Then you must be the medic," she said. "On... _his_ team," she finished, obviously not wanting to say Minato's name.

Rin didn't so much as flinch. "I was at the time. Do you know why we're here?"

"I can guess," Shizune said, her eyes flicking past them to look back up into the hallway. "Let's go somewhere else first, though. Just in case."

Rin blinked. Shizune really _did move_ like a shinobi in hiding, because she was in hiding. The question was, who was she hiding from? Rin pressed a kiss to Toboe's warm skull and dismissed her. The summon had done an excellent job tracking Shizune, but subtlety was not her strong suit.

Shizune led them out of the apartment block with quick, sure steps. "Your disguises are good," she whispered, glancing over her shoulder, "but you still move like shinobi."

Rin opened her mouth to protest, but Shizune shook her head. "Not you. Him."

Kakashi huffed, but Shizune wasn't wrong. His spine was too straight and tension ran through his limbs like electricity crackling along a life wire. He glanced between them, and when Rin didn't jump to his defense, he sighed and dropped his shoulders, slouching. He shortened his stride and stuffed his hands into his pockets. "Better?"

Rin grinned. "There's a more familiar sight," she said, bumping his shoulder with hers. He rolled his eyes but didn't readjust his posture.

Shizune gave him a quick nod of approval. "If you look unassuming people will expect less of you. It's a good habit to grow into." She took hold of Rin's wrist and pulled her along into an alley Rin would have walked straight past without noticing if she had been alone. Shizune's hand was thin and bony, but her grip was strong enough to hurt. Shizune looked pretty unassuming herself, come to think of it. Rin filed it away for an another time.

They took another turn, spiraling deeper and deeper into the grungy heart of the city and leaving the more crowded main street behind until it was little more than a murmur in the distance. This part of the city stank of sewage and mildew. Judging by Kakashi's face, there were plenty of other, nastier smells to go around, too. They ended up before a low building with a wonky little door that Shizune had to pull at several times before it opened.

"Sorry, it's been jammed ever since shishou first entered the place. She doesn't always know her own strength," Shizune said, holding the door open for them.

On the other side lay a small, surprisingly neat living room with a kitchenette. A set of doors presumably led to the bedrooms. "It's not much, but it's home," Shizune shrugged. "Have you had anything to eat?"

"Is Tsunade in here?" Kakashi asked, leafing through a stack of newspapers on the dinner table.

Shizune's expression soured . "She's out for the day," she said curtly.

Rin shot Kakashi a look. When would he learn? She gave Shizune a sheepish smile. "Sorry. We didn't mean to inconvenience you. My name is Nohara Rin. You've already met Kakashi, I believe."

Shizune scowled. "I have."

"... He tends to have that effect on people. But what we're really here for –"

"Tsunade-shishou, right?" Shizune said, moving over to the kitchen to fix them something to eat. "I doubt you're here for me."

Rin winced. "Well…"

"It's all right. I wasn't expecting any differently. I must warn you though, she's not very receptive to Konoha asking her for, well, anything."

Kakashi and Rin exchanged a look again. "What does Konoha usually ask of her?" Rin asked carefully.

"I'm not sure, but the few times she received letters she threw fits," Shizune said, putting plates of food on the table. "Unless you're here for an antidote, or something. She'll lend a hand for those, every now and then."

Rin blinked. "Doesn't she – I mean, I assumed she would still be working as a doctor..."

"A doctor of her caliber would only draw unwanted attention out here. Not that she would, anyway," Shizune said, an edge of bitterness creeping into her voice. "I'm the only healer in this house, as it stands."

Something in Rin stilled. She had never met another medic who had given up that particular career path, aside from herself. Medics, even lesser skilled field medics, enjoyed a healthy dose of prestige and financial stability. Even if they could no longer work in the field, they could transfer to the hospital. It wasn't the kind of job you would just give up.

Unless you were a jinchuuriki, of course. But Tsunade wasn't. What could've happened to turn her away from both her home and the skills that had turned her into a legend?

"Pretty rigorous change of career," Kakashi said, voicing Rin's thoughts.

Shizune looked away. "She has her reasons."

Kakashi looked like he wanted to say something, but instead he squared his jaw and sat down at the table to eat. "Thanks for the food," he said.

Perhaps there was some hope for operation 'turn Kakashi into a reasonable human being', after all. A girl could hope. Rin joined Kakashi at the table and together they waited for Shizune to sit down before they ate. The meal was simple but good, and made Rin feel a heck of a lot better than the greasy hotel food she had been presented with earlier that day.

As they ate, her eyes were drawn to Shizune's hands again. Her knuckles were red and smattered with small thin scars. Her nails were clipped to the quick and meticulously cleaned. These were the hands of a doctor who had recently practiced her art.

Perhaps that's why she had been in that apartment block. Just because her teacher was no longer practicing, it didn't necessarily mean Shizune had quit as well. A medic could do a lot of good, even in a civilian city.

But not if she wanted to remain unnoticed. Rin frowned. "Shizune-san... I'm not sure how to ask you, but is it really safe for you to use medical jutsu in the city?" She asked, deciding a direct approach would be best.

Shizune stilled and put down her chopsticks. "How do you –"

"Your knuckles and fingertips are red. It's quite common, after using medical ninjutsu," Rin offered.

Shizune gave her hands a surprised look. "I didn't think of that."

"You're openly using it? That seems like a surefire way to get civvies lining up before your door," Kakashi said.

"Except that they won't," Shizune said. "They know better than to draw attention to me. I wouldn't be able to help them out if the wrong people found out about me."

"So you _are_ hiding from someone," Rin concluded.

Shizune huffed. "Yes. No. It's complicated. Look." She stood up and rummaged in one of the cupboards next to the wall. She pulled out a piece of paper and put it on the table. It was a wanted poster. A kunoichi with a scratched out headband leered back at them from a black-and-white photograph.

"She calls herself Jun. These posters used to be all over the place, but they were removed after she made a deal with the mayor. Now she can do whatever she likes. Hurt whoever she likes. She stays away from us because she knows she's no match for shishou, but at the same time shishou doesn't do anything to stop her, either." Shizune's hands hold into fists. "So I do what I can to make things a little bit easier for the people who cannot stand up to her. I'd fight Jun myself, but I wouldn't win."

Her eyes turned sad. "Jun is incredibly powerful, and she has four shinobi lieutenants. Together, they make people pay them 'taxes', with the certain knowledge that they'll lose their homes and possibly their lives if they don't. Jun only picks on the lower class, so that the town doesn't look neglected and the more influential citizens don't protest. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Keeps Iwa from finding out about her. Then again, the town is too scared of Jun to risk retribution anyway."

"Is it still safe for you here?" Rin asked, her gut churning. A single rogue shinobi could do a lot of damage amongst a civilian population.

"Safe enough. Jun knows about us but keeps away, generally speaking. Shishou's reputation protects us." Shizune's eyes dropped to the table. "Either way, we won't leave until Tsunade-shishou is ready."

A brief silence followed.

"But Tsunade-hime isn't helping anyone," Rin said incredulously. "Even though she could beat this Jun."

"I told you. She has her reasons."

Kakashi crossed his arms over his chest. "She's not being any good to anyone."

"She's not being any good to herself, either," Shizune bit back, eyes blazing. "She's –"

Shizune cut herself off midsentence, her anger disappearing like a deflating balloon. "I'm sorry. I realize what it must look like to you, but… There's this saying. 'If you can't take care of yourself, you cannot take care of others'. That's true for her, I think."

Kakashi shifted, and Rin found herself watching him. His expression did something complicated, and then his gaze dropped. Rin resisted the urge to grab his hand and squeeze it. Instead, she turned back to Shizune.

"I can understand that, a little," Rin said, because oh, of course she could. "But we have something very important to ask Tsunade-hime. Not as a warrior, or even as a sannin – but as the world's greatest medic. There's someone back in Konoha who needs her very much. If we could have brought her with us, we would have, but in her condition she cannot be moved. So, we came to you instead."

Shizune finally lifted her gaze from the table to search Rin's eyes. Shizune opened and closed her mouth a few times, as if she didn't know what to say. "Someone… Back in Konoha? Who cannot be moved?" She sat back in her chair, wide-eyed. "You mean you want shishou to come with you to Konoha."

Rin bit her lip. Shizune's first response wasn't promising. "We do."

Shizune stared, then shook her head. "I'm sorry, but… That's not going to happen. She's not going to come with you. Tsunade-shishou isn't going anywhere."

Rin felt herself go cold at the conviction in Shizune's voice. "Shizune, I know you want to protect her, but we have someone to protect as well –"

"I'm sorry," Shizune said forcefully. "I really am. But I don't think she'll ever go back to Konoha."

Kakashi, who had been watching them quietly, finally spoke up again. "Have you asked her?"

He sounded calm enough, but Rin saw the tension in his frame. It was the same tension she felt herself. If they couldn't convince Tsunade… Poor, sweet Kushina would never wake up, and her son would remain an orphan. Rin felt nauseous.

Shizune looked drained. Had she looked that tired all day?

"I used to ask," Shizune said. "When I was younger. I remember living there, you see. I lost my parents early on, but I lived there with my uncle until he died. I was six when we left. I was homesick for months. Every now and then, the need to go home would crop back up, but shishou insisted there was nothing for us there. I don't even have an official rank," she finished, smiling wryly.

"Do you still want to go?" Rin asked quietly.

Shizune was quiet for a moment. "I'd… Like to have a permanent home. We travel a lot. It's hard to make friends. Nowhere feels like home."

"So, go to Konoha," Kakashi said bluntly. "You're an adult, aren't you?"

Shizune glared at him. "And abandon the woman who raised me? Never."

"She loves you. Perhaps she'll follow." Kakashi shrugged.

"Not that much," Shizune scoffed, looking away. Her eyes shone wetly. She seemed to notice it at the same time that Rin did, and quickly wiped at her eyes. "This patient of yours. Who is she?" She said, changing the subject.

Rin had to swallow past the lump in her throat. Shizune doubted the love of the closest thing she had to a parent. Rin knew the feeling. It seemed that it didn't stop either of them from still loving their wayward parents, though. Rin still loved her father. Shizune still loved Tsunade.

But the context wasn't the same. Shizune wasn't broken, or host to a monster. She was a compassionate, talented, _normal_ person. The issue wasn't with her, it was with Tsunade, who suffered from some mysterious ailment that kept her from making anything of her life. So perhaps, it was something that could be changed.

"– Kushina," Kakashi was saying. "Our teacher's wife. She's in a coma."

"Oh – I'm sorry. Ever since the attack, two years ago?" Shizune replied.

"Yes."

Shizune sighed. "I wish I had been there to help out the wounded. We didn't learn of the attack until it had already ended. But if she has been in a coma for two years, I'm not sure how much even shishou could do for her."

"If anyone could do it, it's her."

The change in the air was a sudden as a midsummer thunderstorm. One moment they were talking, the next Kakashi and Rin instinctively stilled as a new chakra presence made itself known. It danced at the edges of their awareness as though it refused to let its existence be denied. It was the kind of chakra capacity that could only remain hidden if its owner really, really tried.

Minato-sensei had usually been kind enough to keep his repressed. So had Kushina.

Senju Tsunade made no such efforts. Her chakra presence loomed in their minds like an executioner's blade, sharp and unrelenting. Sanbi sat up and _took notice_. No wonder Jun and her gang knew she was here.

 _You didn't tell me this woman is a_ Senju, Sanbi crooned in the back of Rin's head, searching for footholds to claw out and take over.

Rin squared her jaw and pushed her chakra in as far she could, and Sanbi down with it. So long as she didn't have to fight…

Slow footsteps approached the front door, and then the door creaked open. Senju Tsunade frowned as she took them in with an unfocused gaze. "Visitors. Huh."

She slammed the door shut with the hand that wasn't holding a sake bottle. "Might've warned me," she muttered, and walked past them without any further acknowledgment. She put the bottle on one of the kitchen counters and turned around slowly, leaning back and tilting her head a little as she took them in.

"Tsunade-shishou." Shizune seemed to wake from her daze first and shot up to her feet. "I made lunch. There is some left, if you'd like…"

"Hmm. Thanks," Tsunade huffed, not looking away from Kakashi and Rin. Her blonde hair fell limply around her face, and although she looked youthful for her age her eyes were full of strain. She was also most definitely drunk. "Funniest thing happened today," she drawled. "I won at blackjack."

Shizune looked surprised. "You – you did?"

"Yeah. So, I stayed to have a drink. Figured I would need it."

Kakashi stood up, his face a study in repressed emotion. "Tsunade-hime. My name is Hatake Kakashi, and this is my friend, Nohara Rin. I believe you might remember me."

Tsunade's gaze swiveled back to meet his. "Huh. You've changed."

Kakashi ran a hand through his hair. "It's this revolutionary new tool, they call them scissors," he drawled back. "You might have heard of them."

Tsunade snorted. Then, her eyes landed on Rin. "You're Minato's kids. The medic and the genius," she said, in a mocking tone. "Weren't you supposed to be the next me, or something?" She asked Rin.

Rin was too stunned to answer.

Tsunade snorted again and made a dismissive gesture. "I wouldn't recommend it, anyway. Besides, then Hatake would have to go evil. And your team idiot would have to – I don't know, what's he doing anyway? Running away from the village like Jiraiya?"

"Obito is dead," Rin said.

A muscle in Kakashi's jaw jumped. Shizune went very still.

Tsunade flinched. Her gaze dropped and she turned back to the counter, moving some of the assorted bottles and plates around seemingly at random before grabbing one of the bottles and holding it up against the light. When she was satisfied, she uncorked it and took a long swallow. "Right. Knew I had forgotten something," she muttered.

" _Tsunade-shishou,"_ Shizune hissed.

Kakashi looked like he was capable of murder right about now, and Rin wasn't sure she would stop him. Nothing good had ever come from following her baser instincts, though. She took his wrist and squeezed it.

"We are here to ask you for your help," Rin said, and her voice only shook a little. She was proud of that.

"Are you asking for my help, or is Sarutobi?" Tsunade asked, one eye closed as she peered into the bottle to see if there was anything else left inside.

It took a moment for Rin to realize she meant the Hokage. "I am. We are," Rin said, pulling at Kakashi's arm to show who 'we' was. She was on his bad side, but without the mask she could see his face had relaxed just a little.

"Huh. Small victories, I guess," Tsunade said. "Why, though?"

"Kushina needs your help," Kakashi said. "She's been in a coma since the attack."

For a moment, there was something terribly vulnerable in Tsunade's expression. It disappeared almost as quickly. "Is that so?"

"We need you to get her out of it."

Tsunade narrowed her eyes in thought. She pursed her lips, drummed her fingers on the countertop. Finally, she spoke. "It's been two years. Kushina is dead. I'm sorry, kid. You'll have to go home empty-handed."

It was a good thing Rin was already holding onto Kakashi's arm, or his forward surge might have actually reached Tsunade. Instead, Rin grabbed hold of him with both hands and pulled back, despite the roaring in her ears. Kakashi might have forced the issue, but even he was sensible enough to know attacking a sannin head-on in a flash of hot rage was a really bad idea. Even for the prodigy of his generation. He fell back next to Rin, wide-eyed and shoulders heaving. Rin let go of his arm to find that her hands were shaking. She wasn't sure if it was shock, anger, or both.

"She is not dead," Kakashi growled, echoing Rin's thoughts, "but she might as well be if you don't help."

Tsunade's face tightened. "Don't blame me for things I am not responsible for, brat. I am _not_ Konoha's keeper. I refuse to be. Now, either get out of my house or make yourself useful."

With that, she turned to Shizune, visibly relaxing her shoulders and lightening her voice in a bid at nonchalance. "That Jun woman you keep going on about? One of her lieutenants had a little bit too much to drink last night. Said they're going for a raid tonight. You said you wanted to stop them, but that you needed help. Use these two, then." She gestured at Kakashi and Rin. "Anything, to get them out of my hair."

With that, she stormed out of the kitchen and disappeared into one of the other rooms, the door slamming shut behind her.

She left a deathly silence behind.

* * *

 **AN:**

 **So. Vodka Aunt Tsunade is a real piece of work, isn't she? Don't hate her, though – living with serious grief, undiagnosed PTSD** _ **and**_ **a blood phobia without a proper support system is hell. She needs help, not hate!**

 **Let me know what you think!**


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7.

* * *

 **If you don't remember Tsunade's past, this might be where you may want to brush up on it...**

 **Some harsher language from Tsunade in this chapter. Be warned if that's not your cup of tea.**

* * *

Kakashi was still fuming by the time it was finally dark enough for him and Shizune to leave. The anger thrumming through his body reminded him of being twelve again, young and stupid and in pain. Unlike his twelve-year-old self, though, he knew better than to alienate his hosts even further than he already had. It had been stupid and childish to surge towards Tsunade, and he was glad Rin had been there to stop him. His action showed a lack of self-restraint he felt he really should have grown past by now. He was ANBU, for crying out loud. He was renowned for being able to keep a cool head in times of crisis. So why hadn't he been able to?

The answer to that was very simple, of course. He clenched his jaw as he landed on a flat rooftop just behind Shizune. He had lost his temper because this time, it was personal. Kushina's life lay in the balance and indirectly, so did Naruto's. They were… Family.

They deserved better than a bitter old woman who was too selfish to try, regardless of what she had been through.

"Remind me again why we're doing this?" He said, forcefully distracting himself.

Shizune snorted as she turned to look at him over her shoulder. She'd switched out her black dress for a pair of dark pants and a long-sleeved shirt covering forearm braces that could hold her poison darts. Now that the sun had gone down, she blended in almost perfectly with the shadows.

"I knew I should have asked Rin along instead," she said. "We're doing this because we want to help people. People who don't deserve what's being done to them, even if they are from a different country than yours."

Kakashi sniffed. She made him sound terrible. "We were at war barely two years ago."

"With Iwa. Not with these people. And anyway, I was no part of that."

Kakashi couldn't make out whether she sounded pleased or disappointed. He hummed under his breath and joined her at the ledge of the roof to look across the street that lay below.

"Looks quiet enough," he murmured." What do you know of their abilities?"

"Jun is strong. Upper-level jonin strong. Her lieutenants, not so much. I'd say they're about chunin level. Three of them, anyway. I haven't seen the fourth fight."

"And what level are you at?" Kakashi asked, unable to stop himself. Well, he did need to know what his temporary teammate was capable of, and he had never seen her fight.

Shizune's eyebrow twitched in a way that was very reminiscent of her master. "Good enough to take on a few chunin, I should think," she said primly. "Don't get any ideas."

He shrugged. "Just checking. So what's the plan? Attacking them head-on doesn't seem like a great idea, if this Jun person is so strong…"

He wasn't exactly a slouch himself, but without knowing Jun's abilities and with the constraints of the city living and breathing around them, he couldn't be certain that he would win. That, and Danzou had given him permission to find Tsunade – not to pick fights on former enemy territory.

Shizune didn't immediately answer. "Perhaps attacking them would be better."

"Oh?"

"Jun's probably not doing the raiding herself. She tends not to get her hands dirty unless she absolutely has to. Her lieutenants are rowdy and tend to be the ones to do the most damage. By which I mean roughing up the people they're exploiting, or smashing the furniture." Shizune's hands tightened around the ledge, turning her knuckles white.

Kakashi thought it through. If these guys were just thugs rather than Iwa shinobi…"Better wait until after they're done. Make it look like a robbery, or something." He held up his hands in defense when she glared at him. "I know, I know. It's just that if you barge in during the raid it will be obvious you're targeting them specifically. Jun will find out. Better for us to isolate, say, two of the lieutenants afterwards, and weaken her support. One would be even less conspicuous."

Shizune frowned. "They like the party life, that's for sure. It's not inconceivable some random shinobi passerby could end up knocking them out. Or... For one of them to disappear." A sharp smile crept onto her face.

Kakashi gave her a blank look. "Do you want to kidnap one or kill one? Because the first seemed more like your MO but the grin makes me think the second."

She punched his shoulder. "The first, of course! Who do you take me for?"

"A shinobi," Kakashi deadpanned.

"I'm a medic first, thank you very much."

"So?"

"Well, ask Rin. She's not a frontline fighter."

Kakashi stilled. Technically not, perhaps, but... "She's not a medic anymore. Anyway, still a bad excuse."

Shizune gave him a baffled look. "Not a...? How does that work?"

"I don't know. Just don't ask her, it's sensitive."

"Then what do you –"

"You shouldn't ask _me_ about it either," he said, as dryly as he could manage.

"You can't just say something like that and then never explain it!"

"I think you'll find that I can."

"... Has anyone ever told you you're an asshole?"

"Maybe. I tend not to listen."

Whatever Shizune might have wanted to say was interrupted by a drawn-out scream across the square. A moment later a door slammed open, light spilling out onto the road as a woman came tumbling onto her hands and knees. She was crying and clutching at her night clothes.

A tall, black-haired man stepped out after her, chewing gum and staring down at her with an expression of utter boredom. If not for his utter apathy in the face of her misery, he would have been quite handsome. "You should have just paid up. Would have saved you from a whole world of pain," he drawled, his voice only just loud enough for Kakashi's enhanced hearing to pick it up.

"Father, father," the woman screamed, trying to look past the tall man into the house. "Please, don't hurt him!"

Tall, dark and handsome's reply was lost by Shizune's sudden whisper. "I can't make out what he's saying, but I recognize him. He's the wildcard – I have no idea what he can do. Doesn't waste his time drinking and gambling, though, and he's Jun's favorite. Actually, I'm not sure he ever leaves her side –"

A series of loud bangs and shouts from inside the house with the woman on the street crumple and sob. "Please, please," she keened.

"No money, no protection," Tall, dark and handsome shrugged.

"No one is helping," Kakashi noted. Indeed, the other doors and windows in the street remained closed. "Too scared?"

Shizune nodded, biting her lip. "Anyone who is found helping gets the same punishment."

"Hmph. Fun little gang."

Shizune visibly had a hard time not leaping into action as the abuse continued. Kakashi didn't much enjoy the experience himself, either. Shizune was right; no one deserved this treatment, no matter which hidden village they happened to be sharing their country with. Standing by and doing nothing while he knew the perpetrators would be no match for him at all had him feeling tetchy and irritable.

They had to wait for an excruciating fifteen minutes before the noises inside finally stopped and the shinobi responsible finally filed out of the house. They were a short, brown haired man with slightly hunched shoulders and an overeager grin, and a tall woman who looked very familiar.

"Jun," Shizune breathed.

Jun looked much as she did on her wanted poster; a tall, toned woman in her late thirties with strong features, full red lips, and a buzz-cut. Her right ear was little more than a mutilated piece of skin. Around her neck, she bore an old, scratched-through Suna hitai-ate.

She wore a sardonic grin as she leaned over the sobbing woman still sitting on the street, and jingled a purse of coins before her face. "Thank you very much, milady," Jun said, in a breathy, melodic voice.

The woman on the street cringed and made herself even smaller. Her sobs intensified. The tall black-haired man sighed and made a hand sign before placing his hand on her head. Her body went limp and she fell without a sound.

Jun grinned. Tall, dark and handsome bounced his eyebrows. The brown-haired man stayed at a slight distance and laughed nervously.

Jun's gaze cut to him, and she made a sharp gesture with her head. "Go on, go. You can't wait to go back to your little games, can you? Anyway, Toshiro-kun and I have business of our own." She smiled seductively and ran her hand up Tall, dark and handsome's arm. "Money always gets me in the mood."

Shizune made a soft, disgusted sound.

Jun and her lover ambled away as though they were merely a couple enjoying the sights rather than hardened criminals who had just hurt someone to get their money. Their weaselly companion watched them go until they turned the corner, then glanced down at the woman still unconscious on the street. He gave her a swift, hard kick to the ribs, giggled, and then scurried off into the shadows.

"Get him," Shizune hissed. "I will check up on the family."

Kakashi nodded, and allowed himself to be cloaked in shadow.

* * *

Rin regretted not going with Kakashi and Shizune almost instantly. Sure, she had a good excuse in that she couldn't hide anywhere near as well as they could, but not going felt too much like cowardice for her liking. Especially since she had nothing to do but sit and twiddle her thumbs as her hostess, for lack of a better word, snored off her hangover in the bedroom.

So Rin had grabbed a notepad and the one remaining containment seal from Kakashi's backpack, and had started to copy the intricate lines and commit them to memory. It was slow going – her hand wasn't practiced enough to be steady, and she found she kept overlooking the little squiggly lines squeezed between the thicker, straighter circles. She couldn't discern any kind of pattern, and wondered at Minato-sensei's ability to come up with something this complicated on the fly.

Or for that matter, how on Earth Kakashi thought he could progress and improve his skill at sealing without anyone to teach him. He had to know enough of the basics to be able to expand on them… She had seen the wards he liked to place on their apartment, of course. Whenever they got back home, she would have to look at them more closely and see how they differed from the one she was currently looking at.

Frankly, it might as well have been advanced algebra for all that she could understand it, but even algebra could be learned if you put enough time in. Rin was clever – it would be worth taking the time to learn the basics. There was no such thing as having too much knowledge.

She was startled out of her thoughts by a strangled shout from the bedroom. Rin's heart leapt. Another moan, then a few unintelligible words and –

Rin ripped open the bedroom door, but there was no assassin waiting for her on the other side, no burglar regretting his choice of target, no danger at all. There was only Tsunade, tangled up in her sheets and writhing as if she was in pain. "No, nonono no..."

Rin's breath hitched. The bedroom was windowless and dark, only illuminated by the room behind her. Her hand found the light switch and the bulb overhead flickered to life, revealing Tsunade's screwed up face. "No," she groaned again.

" Tsunade-hime," Rin said, stepping forward carefully. She didn't want to get too close. "You have to wake up. You're having a nightmare."

Tsunade threw her head to the side. She clawed at the sheets, tearing away a piece of fabric like paper. Perhaps it was the sound of tearing fabric that woke her up, but she shot up like a Jack-in-the-Box, her brown eyes blind with panic.

" Tsunade-hime," Rin repeated. Easy, now. "You had a nightmare. It's okay – you're safe."

Slowly, the panic receded from Tsunade-hime's eyes. It was replaced by a terrible weariness, which in a way was worse. Her gaze dropped to her lap, to her tightly balled fists. She uncurled her fingers slowly, revealing crescent-shaped cuts in her palms. She let out a shaky breath as blood curled away from one of the deeper wounds.

Rin bit her lip. "Do you have any antiseptic in the house?" She asked, approaching the older woman as she would a cornered dog. She sat down on the edge of the bed and reached out for Tsunade's hands.

Tsunade snatched them away. "It's fine, it'll heal on its own," she said hoarsely.

"If you would let me look at them –"

"I said it's _fine_. Just get me some Band-Aids," Tsunade said, looking away.

Rin sighed. Well, at least she had some experience with stubborn patients. "Where –?"

"Bathroom."

Rin nodded. A quick search in the bathroom resulted in her finding a small med-kit, old but well-stocked. The Band-Aids were colorful and clearly meant for children, but that would hardly matter. She took them, as well as a bottle of disinfectant, and returned to the bedroom.

The bed was abandoned, sheets kicked away, and the door to the living room gaped open. Rin followed through and found Tsunade sitting at the table, face in her hands.

The best thing to do for a recalcitrant patient, Rin knew, was to take charge as a mother would of her child; be the voice of authority and comfort, and override any fleeing attempts with logic.

"Don't make it worse," she said, gently pulling on Tsunade's right wrist and uncurling her fingers.

Tsunade gave her a bleary eyed look, but miraculously, didn't protest. "Who are you again?" She croaked.

"Rin. We met earlier this afternoon, remember?"

"Vaguely." A beat. "Namikaze's student."

"That's right," Rin said, putting the antiseptic on a cloth and dabbing the cuts with them. She noticed Tsunade was deliberately looking the other way. "Here to ask you for your help," she added.

Tsunade huffed. "Didn't think anyone would find me."

"Kakashi has unusual skills," Rin said. The cuts weren't particularly deep. They would heal fine on their own.

"Kakashi… Hatake, right? What's he done with his hair?"

Rin couldn't stop herself from smiling. Even to someone who barely knew him, Kakashi without his trademark hair was a difficult concept. "It's too distinctive. We didn't want anyone to recognize him out here."

"Hmph. He's just a kid. Who's going to recognize him?"

"He's not your average kid." Rin hummed thoughtfully and took Tsunade's other wrist. Again, Tsunade let her, although she didn't look particularly happy about it.

"Aren't you a medic? Can't you just close them without all this fussing?" Tsunade asked, drawing a circle on the table with her already treated hand. Her eyes were boring holes into the wall behind them.

"I'm not, and anyway, it would be a waste of chakra."

Tsunade watched her with suspicious eyes. "Not a...? Aren't you little miss 'field transplant at twelve'? What do you mean, you're not a medic?"

Rin's stomach turned. "You've heard about that?"

Tsunade snorted. "I have. You impressed quite a few people with that. Who did you implant it to?"

"I – I figured you would know that, too."

"I stopped listening the moment it wasn't about medical ninjutsu anymore."

Rin stopped her movements. Tsunade's second hand was fine, anyway. A laugh climbed its way up into Rin's mouth. In a strange way, Tsunade reminded her of Kakashi. "Which is why you didn't know about Obito either," she said softly.

Tsunade's face softened. She sniffed. "Yeah. Sorry about that. Sometimes, when I have too much to drink..." She shrugged.

Rin waited for her to finish her sentence, but it seemed that was all Tsunade had to say about the subject.

"It was Obito's eye," Rin finally said. "He gave it to Kakashi."

Tsunade stilled. Her expression did something complicated, and then she nodded. "And you were twelve," she said, matter-of-factly.

"Yes."

Tsunade didn't say anything for a moment, but then a chuckle escaped her. "Fucking Konoha," she said.

Rin looked away. "Konoha didn't mean for it to –"

"Then they shouldn't send kids to war," Tsunade snapped. "Breaking young medics' backs."

Rin leaned back in her own chair as a chill ran up her spine. Sanbi chuckled. Perhaps Tsunade wasn't wrong, but thinking it – feeling it – felt like a betrayal. Blasphemy. Minato had sent them out. Minato would never have hurt them. Or Sarutobi. They were good people.

Right?

Her mind caught onto something else Tsunade had said. "Why do you think that's the last time I healed anyone? The transplant?" She asked, before she could think better of it.

"Isn't it?" Tsunade leaned in, her eyes suddenly keen. Rin swallowed. She had almost forgotten that behind the veneer of drunkenness and fear lay one of the world's most formidable minds.

Rin squared her jaw, but she didn't know what to say. She wasn't a natural liar; aside from the one lie that kept her alive she rarely spoke anything but the truth. Her mind wasn't like Kakashi's, who could spin out new truths like they were jutsu.

"It was a little later," she said, trying to ignore the pounding of her heart.

Tsunade leaned back, clearly suspicious, but the expression slowly melted off her face. "Right," she said, then let out a long sigh. "Don't suppose it's any of my damn business," she muttered.

Tsunade had stopped being a medic somewhere along the way, too. Perhaps she could understand not wanting to share her reasons. Although… Rin thought of how she had avoided looking at her own injuries. What had that been about? Rin didn't dare to ask.

The awkward silence was broken when Tsunade, still drawing circles on the table, ran her fingers across Rin's attempts at copying the containment seal. Tsunade's brow furrowed, and she pulled the sheets towards herself. "What's this?" She muttered, eyes flicking over the original.

"Ah, I –" Rin started, but her words failed her once more.

"This is some kind of repression seal, isn't it? What do you have that for?" Tsunade asked, turning the seal over a few times. "Good work, too."

"You're – you're a seals expert?"

Tsunade gave her a sharp look. "You think Uzumaki Mito would let her granddaughter become a kunoichi without teaching her anything?"

Rin opened and closed her mouth uselessly. Right. _Right_. She was talking to a legend.

Tsunade snorted at her expression and turned back to the seal. "Is this Namikaze's work? I recognize his style – very precise."

"Y-yes. It is."

"For Hatake's eye, is it?"

Rin leapt for the opportunity like a drowning man would a log. "Yes! He has trouble regulating the in and output of his chakra."

Tsunade frowned a little deeper, but if she noticed Rin's slightly too fast response she didn't say anything. "This is way too strong, though. Stupid kid could end up killing himself. Doesn't he know what he's doing?"

"He's... Still learning," Rin said, mentally apologizing to Kakashi for making him look bad in front of Tsunade. "This is just a template."

"Hmm." Tsunade pursed her lips and put the seal back onto the table. "He'd be better off with a seal that regulates rather than contains.

"Thing is though, you were trying to copy the seal, not adjust it," she continued, pointing at Rin's work. "Which makes me think this repression seal is of some use to you as it is. I mean, if the two of you are as brilliant as Jiraiya suggested..."

Tsunade didn't look up once as she spoke, but there was no mistaking her tone. She knew something was off.

Rin squared her jaw. Did Tsunade know her grandmother had been a jinchuuriki? Mito had died shortly before Rin was born, which would have placed Tsunade in her early twenties. Plenty of time to find out. Did she know Kushina was a jinchuuriki, for that matter? How much could Rin reveal?

Then again, they could hardly expect Tsunade to heal Kushina without telling her about the enormous, fox-shaped elephant in the room.

Rin wasn't good with lies, but she could bend the truth a little.

"How well do you know Kushina-san?" Rin asked finally.

Tsunade blinked. She clearly hadn't expected that question. "Not extremely well, admittedly."

"Do you know of her... Status, in the village?"

"Status? How do you...?"

"That she is your grandmother's successor?" Rin asked.

The frown finally fell away from Tsunade's face. It made her look younger, more like the woman Rin suspected she had been when she had earned her nickname. A muscle twitched underneath Tsunade's eye. "Frankly," she finally said, "I'm more surprised _you_ know about that."

Rin smiled faintly. _That, and more_. "Minato sensei told us, a long time ago."

Tsunade's gaze fell once more unto the suppression seal. "This is for Kushina?" She asked.

"It's meant to repress out-of-control jinchuuriki," Rin said truthfully. It didn't feel fair to lie by omission, but she couldn't bring herself to do otherwise. The thought of revealing herself was too big, too frightening. It was the part of her that she liked least. The part of her that was afraid to tell anyone was her second least favorite.

"You think I can wake her up. And that she might lose control when she does," Tsunade stated, breaking Rin out her thoughts.

"She's not in a normal coma. She's in a coma because kyuubi was ripped out of her body, split in half, and then forced back in." Rin shivered at the thought. She remembered feeling like her body was torn apart, every muscle stretching, every bone breaking, her chakra wheeling and almost vanishing as something so much bigger than herself was forced into the seal on her own stomach. The pain of it had been too much for her brain to comprehend, as though it simply shut down and refus from ed to acknowledge what was happening. Shock, perhaps. Kushina had lived through that and more, _while giving birth_. Kushina was made of diamond.

"And when she does wake up," Rin forced herself to say, "it will be to the discovery that the love of her life is dead and that she has missed the first few years of her child's existence."

It hurt just to say it.

Tsunade flinched. Her hands balled into fists and she stood up, pacing across the room to look out of the window, the line of her shoulders tense. "Then isn't it better for her not to wake up?" She said, almost too low for Rin to understand.

Anger flashed through Rin's stomach, briefly peaking Sanbi's attention. "She can go on with her life. And her orphan son will have a mother," she bit out. "And it will hurt, yes, but she is more than just sensei's wife. She is her own person, and she deserves – she –"

Rin realized, much to her surprise, that she was crying. Hot tears dripped across her cheeks and her throat felt constricted and painful. She missed Kushina, _so much_. And Minato, _oh_ – she missed their laughter, their stupid jokes, their terrible taste in food, the way they had so selflessly embraced Kakashi, Obito and Rin into this makeshift little family...

But they would never have Minato back, or Obito. Kushina, at least, still had a chance. Their family of two could be a family of four, with Kushina and Naruto and Kakashi and Rin herself. There could be laughter again, and terrible jokes, and the unhealthiest diet this side of the equator, and... And she really, really wanted Kushina and Naruto to meet.

Tsunade watched her with an unreadable expression. "You're not supposed to cry. Rule 25," she said, without much conviction.

"Rule 25 only counts during battle."

Tsunade smirked, then let out a sharp bark of laughter. "Yeah – fair enough. Fair enough, kid." She turned back to the window. It had gone dark outside, but the stars remained obscured behind a much taller buildings on the other side of the street. Instead, the lights of the city danced across the glass, casting a warm orange glow.

"You still love Konoha, don't you, kid?" Tsunade asked quietly. "You still have faith in it. How come?"

Rin shrugged, wiping at her tears. She should have felt more self-conscious, perhaps, but she couldn't bring herself to care. "I don't know. The people, I guess. My friends. I don't – I know it's not perfect."

Tsunade snorted."' Not perfect', ha. Putting it mildly," she muttered. "Konoha is a shitfest, kid. But so are all shinobi villages."

"Yeah I – I got that impression," Rin sniffed, Roshi's voice echoing through her memory.

"Better to get away from it. Better not to get involved."

Rin shook her head. "I can't walk away from it."

"Why not?"

Rin shrugged again. "It's home," she said.

Tsunade sighed softly. "You are still young, I suppose," she said.

"So's most of the village," Rin said, not understanding.

"You don't realize yet that you have a choice, that you could walk away –" Tsunade cut herself off. "None of you do." She looked surprised at her own words. "But then it's not a choice for most, is it..?"

"A choice? What do you mean?"

Tsunade shook her head. "Never you mind." She looked deep in thought as she turned back to the window. The light from outside cast her in a golden hue.

"Go to bed," she said, voice taking on a commanding note. "You can take the couch. There should be extra blankets in Shizune's room."

With that, she turned and entered her bedroom, shutting the door behind her and leaving Rin behind with an unsettling sense of confusion.

* * *

 **AN**

 **I had way too much fun with Rin and Tsunade's discussion, does it show? I'd really, really like to have some of the adults starting to take responsibility. I think this is the point where Tsunade realizes that she didn't, when she walked away.**

 **Thoughts? Comments are writing fuel! Next chapter should be a bit more upbeat.**


	8. Chapter 8

Hey all,

I have permanently moved to AO3 because of its much more convenient uploading system. I actually finished Inheritance yesterday and have posted the whole thing there. I may eventually post it here, but don't hold your breath – although I would love to put a smile on all of your faces by posting it here, personal (health) reasons make it rather difficult for me to use this website.

If you're still interested in reading this story and whatever may follow, go check out my AO3 account! ( V_eritas or Hiiraeth).

Thank you, and enjoy your day!


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